


Why Mad Scientists Should Be Banned

by Arasinyah



Category: The Hobbit - All Media Types
Genre: Cross-Posted on FanFiction.Net, F/M, Inter-dimensional travel, Modern Girl in Middle Earth, Sci-Fi (sorta), Stuff
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-02-08
Updated: 2015-03-26
Packaged: 2018-03-11 05:55:02
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 20
Words: 51,202
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3316679
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Arasinyah/pseuds/Arasinyah
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Hi, my name is Alessia Medici. I have coffee coloured straight hair that goes down to my shoulder blades, blue eyes that have been laser surgery-ed to give me twenty-twenty vision (an upgrade from the previous blurriness) and according to my ex-boyfriend, I am emotionally unavailable and a frigid bitch. Oh and did I mention that I am burdened with Great Purpose?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

There are people who are born great and there are those that have greatness thrust upon them. Most of the times people who have greatness thrust upon them fail. Epically. You see those who are born with greatness have time to deal with it, they learn how to live with greatness. Those who aren't born with it usually have heart attacks and die young. For some reason I have had greatness thrust upon me and will probably fall in with the statistics and have a heart attack. To be honest it is a comforting thought since heart attacks are something I am well prepared for. Our family has a history of heart disease.

Hi, my name is Alessia Medici. I have coffee coloured straight hair that goes down to my shoulder blades, blue eyes that have been laser surgery-ed to give me twenty-twenty vision (an upgrade from the previous blurriness) and according to my ex-boyfriend, I am emotionally unavailable and a frigid bitch.

Oh and did I mention that I am burdened with Great Purpose? Because I kind of am.

That wasn't always the case. Well it was because even before Greatness was thrust upon me, I had a great job to do. It just wasn't great with a capital G. But it was tough.

You see, I am my brother's keeper. Not in that sappy Cameron Diaz movie kind of way but quite literally I am his keeper. He is the equivalent of a giant Great Dane gone rampant and I am the poor woman you see trying to hold on to the leash but is destined run after him for the rest of her life with the pooper scooper in hand.

It's quite sad really. Most people don't even know my name. The people who call me mostly address me as Alex's sister.

That's my brother, Alexander Medici. Boy genius, emphasis on the boy. He is smart, ridiculously so and has the emotional development, understanding of rules and self control of the usual teenage boy (see also: non-existent).

Alex is fifteen, I'm twenty two. Our parents were scientists, brilliant ones in fact, so brilliant that they went to the sun. And never returned, most likely burnt to a crisp. Ironically their space ship was named Icarus. Apparently they saw it coming. That happened back when I was eight and Alex was a bouncing bonny baby of one year. We've been raised by our grandmother who is the most amazing remarkable woman ever. Well, most of the times. The other times she forgot we were there. I learnt responsibility very early on. Alex has been inventing since he was five years old and his experiments blew up even back then. I got good at apologies. _Really_ good.

So good, in fact, that I have a very stable job in PR management that I like quite a lot.

Every cloud has its silver lining you see.

That was my great purpose. But now let's move on to my Great purpose.

My brother is a physicist. Don't ask me which type of physicist though. It's not that I don't know, despite not having inherited the same genius level of intellect that my brother boasts of, my IQ is still quite high but it is simply that he dabbles in so many different categories of physics I don't bother classifying it.

Personally I call his batch of science Mad Science because only a lunatic could think of doing what he tries to do. And only a successful lunatic would manage to make those crazy experiments work.

He's a successful lunatic by the way.

His successful lunacy is what led me to my Great Purpose.

Because it landed me in the company of Thorin Oakenshield, son of Thrain and grandson of Thror, King under the mountain and Leader of the Quest to reclaim Erebor from the clutches of Smaug, the dragon.

You see, Great Purpose with a capital G. And highly possible heart attack.


	2. Chapter 2

It was a normal day. The sun was shining but it wasn't shining too much, the birds were chirping but not unnecessarily so, there was a slight wind but there was always a slight wind blowing and I was returning home after picking up groceries and the junk food that Alex had convinced me to get for him on my way back from work. When I say convinced, of course, I mean manipulated. I wanted my dining table cleared of the weird bubbling grey liquid in the complex apparatus and Alex said that he would work faster with caffeine and carbohydrates.

Smartest guy in the world (not to brag, he really is) and what he needs to function is pepsi and funyuns. I could have sworn I did a better job raising him than that.

As per usual I walked, I collected the mail and climbed up the stairs since I didn't have time to go to the gym and began the ascent. The view from the fifteenth floor is beautiful, the walk up, not so much.

"Ally!" Came the voice of one Mrs Costanza, resident of apartment 6A and my former babysitter. I stopped to talk to her because I'm nice like that and also because I really needed a breather.

"Hey Mrs Costanza."

"I need to talk to you sweetie."

"Oh no did Alex experiment on Salt again?" Salt being her cat. Alex loves Salt but also tests some of his creations on Salt. Nothing life threatening but last time Salt had lost all his fur and when it had grown back blue splotches had appeared instead of his usual black ones, a very bright neon blue. It was strange. "Because I've told him again and again-"

"Oh no, it's about you."

"Me?!" I couldn't think of anything I had done in the last three weeks apart from work. How sad is that?

"Well you're not getting any younger sweetie."

"I'm twenty two years old, I don't want to get younger. I want to get old." Very old. I want to be a senior citizen and shake my cane at annoying youngsters who are loud. That is The Dream for me. I can't wait to get old.

What followed was a lecture on how I should get married while I'm still young and attractive. What I heard was this.

"Blah blah blah blah biological cycle blach blah blah children blah blah Aaron was telling me-"

And that's when I started listening.

"What's this about Aaron?"

Aaron is my ex. It did not end well. At all. He called me emotionally shut-off, self involved and vain and I threw him out. Then he proceeded to show up in the building's parking lot with a boombox in his hands. I asked him what he was doing and he laughed patronisingly and asked me if I'd never seen Say Anything. I said no and he yelled back that he refused to date anyone who hadn't seen it. I pointed out that I had broken up with him the day before and so he _wasn't_ dating anyone who hadn't seen the movie and shut the window. Haven't seen him since but googled the movie.

Didn't seem like anything special.

"I'm just saying Aaron was a good egg and won't you reconsider dating him?"

"He called me a frigid bitch."I deadpanned and she laughed before stopping when she realised I was serious. I hadn't laughed when he'd said it though, in fact I think I might have thrown something at him, not sure what because of the crying and stuff. I hope it was something pointy and sharp.

"...Forget Aaron, my grandson is flying in from Chicago."

"I'm not ready to date anyone right now but when I am I'll ask you to set us up."

"I'll hold you to that dear."

"Okay Mrs Costanza." I turned to leave but stopped when she called out my name.

"Oh and you might want to check what Alex is doing. The Robinsons were saying they heard someone else there with him when you weren't there."

"Oh no worries, he's been working on voice modulators."

Five months ago. I don't _what_ he's up to now.

You know it's bad enough that everyone I know is insane but why do I have to be the only sane one who realises how crazy they are? Ignorance isn't bliss, being completely mental is.

Finally after a lot of huffing and puffing I reached our floor and stuck the keys in leaning against the door while I caught my breath. In the mean time I decided to go through the mail.

"Bill, bill, complaint about flashing lights, fellowship letter, complaint, ooh clearance sale in Neiman Marcus!" I like shopping. Retail therapy is actual therapy for me. I talk to the sales girls about my problems the way most people talk to bartenders. With that excitement in mind that I pushed open the door still intent on the catalogue in my hand. I mean come on, 45 percent off on Ralph Lauren is just plain fantastic. I pushed the door shut with my foot and leaned back against it throwing my bag in the general direction of the table. Only for it to land a bit away from me on the floor instead. I sighed and looked up fully expecting that Alex had moved the table.

There was no table. There was none of the pretty speckled tile of our home. Or the pinstriped cream wallpaper stained purple at one side due to a mishap while making blueberry smoothies, or the antique cabinet I had found at a flea market.

It was not home.

This was a wooden house with weirdly rounded edges, low ceilings, so low in fact, that if I was wearing my really high platform heels, my head would have been hitting the chandelier hanging from the rafters and a weird woodsy smell ran through the whole house. Even the door I was leaning against wasn't my door instead it was green and round. A _round_ door.

It was not my home. But it was quite obviously someone else's home.

"ALEX!"


	3. Chapter 3

"ALEX!" I yelled, and dialled his number. It wasn't long before my brother's face was seen on the screen of the phone he had tricked out for me. It was a lovely present and all, and really having every call between him and me automatically rerouted into a video call was nice but this was ridiculous.

"Did you get my funyuns?" He said cool as hell, pouting even while I steamed and boy was I steaming.

"I got the funyuns, I walked in home but I'm not home! What did you do?!"

"What do you mean?" He had the gall to look surprised.

"I opened the door, I walked in but it's not our house! I'm looking out the window and it's some weird countryside shit, Alex what did you do?!"

"Wait what? Hold on." He looked away from the camera but I could still see him in his Den of screens tapping away at something. How did he manage to change our home but still not change where he was? "I have good news and bad news."

"What's the bad news?"

"Well you're not in our world."

"What?!"

"You know how I've been working on creating a wormhole so that I could switch places with myself in the world where I'm Batman?" He said calm as can be even while my eyes were pretty much bugging out of my head.

"NO!" When did he start working on _that_ , I thought he was still working on cloning himself?

And there's a world where he's Batman? What?!

"Oh. Well I was working on a way to create portal into that world. The Batman Me and I have been chatting back and forth and we both agreed to do this little Prince and the Pauper thing."

I didn't know what to say. Being rendered speechless has never happened to me before, I've always had a lot to say.

"So I'm in the world where you're batman?"

"No. I haven't managed to create the portal right, usually when living things go through it they end up dead. Batman Alex said that the fly that flew into the portal dropped and twitched for hours in excruciating pain before dying."

"So I'm still in our world?"

"Noo like I said you're not in our world."

"So I'm in the Batman world?"

"No."

"Where the hell am I?"

How is this my life?!

"According to my calculations you're in Middle Earth, it's a medieval kind of place but I can't be sure of exactly where you are, can you ask around?"

"No, I'm in someone's house but it's empty." I had taken a brief look around and besides that someone was bound to have heard all my screeching by now if they were there. I felt oddly like Goldilocks.

"Well what did you see from the window?"

"Grass and stuff." I shrugged. I'm not exactly a horticulturist.

"Do you see any people?"

I went to the window and looked out once again, this time paying a bit more attention. There was a little man sitting outside, he looked really...tiny. He was sitting on a bench right outside the house so I'm presuming it's his place that I'm crashing in and he was smoking a pipe.

"Umm there's a short guy sitting outside smoking a pipe."

"Short guy, like your kind of short?"

"No I think he might be shorter, can't really tell."

"Hmm." Alex thought it over. "Tell me about his shoes."

I didn't know what good it would do but I did what he said anyway only to realise that the little dude was not wearing any shoes. In fact his feet were kind of huge. Really huge. And they had a lot of hair on them too.

"He has really big hairy feet."

"Oh good you're in the Shire." Alex said, relaxing back in his chair.

"What's the Shire?"

"It's fine, it's this really peaceful place and the people there are really friendly too so you really couldn't have chosen a better place to land in."

"I didn't _choose_ to land in another world." And then I thought over the fact that I was standing in another freaking world and still had network. "Wait how am I able to talk to you?"

Alex snorted still tapping away at the keys. "How did you get to another world without dying?"

"Alex!"

"Look I monitor the worlds I find pretty closely and that means satellites and stuff, it's no big deal."

Unbelievable, he's trying to create a portal to a parallel universe, manages to accidentally send me into an alternate universe, somehow manages to get me great cellphone reception while still stuck in the alternate universe and shrugs it off as 'no big deal'.

But really, even if he did explain it to me I wouldn't understand so I figure I should just let it drop.

"How do I get back?"

"That's the bad news. You can't. Not immediately anyway."

I blinked. "I'm stuck here?!"

"Not forever, I just need to finish my work and figure out a way to get you through the portal without killing you like the fly. I don't even know how you got there, none of my calculations indicated-" He narrowed his eyes at something on one of the screens. "Ohhh that's why, Batman Me had gotten one of components wrong."

"I'm going to kick your ass!" I counted back from one hundred to calm myself. It did not work but honestly my throat was getting hoarse from all the yelling. It's a natural state for me seeing as how I yell at Alex often but it's still a pain. "So what's the good news?"

"You're alive!" He said cheerfully. It didn't feel like good news to me. Not at all. "Plus I've managed to install a pocket dimension in your pocket, check it."

Pocket dimension in my pocket. I can't, I really can't. I just temporarily suspended belief in all basic rules of life and science and just stuck my hand in my pocket and found an ear piece and a piece of flat flexible skin coloured thing with little circuits on it.

"What's this?"

"A universal translator. Luckily for you I've been monitoring worlds and Westron is already added in my database, you can slip on the earpiece and slap that modulator on your throat. It should translate whatever you're saying to Westron and after three days of having it on you won't even need it, I've programmed it so that it sends subliminal information to your Broca's and Wernicke's centres in the brain and you should learn Westron after repeated exposure to it."

"When did you make this? And why?"

What could possibly drive a person to make a device that brainwashes you into learning another language?

"Oh you know, couldn't wait for the English episodes of Psycho Pass, figured this was easier."

Unbelievable. Apparently the answer to that is 'no patience to wait for fansubs of Anime'.

"There's a Japanese class at the annexe you could have joined. Maybe then you'd actually meet people and learn how to ask out the cashier girl you have a flaming crush on."

"Is the guy still there?" He deflected and I looked out the window again.

"Yeah but now there's another guy there and...yeah dude's definitely really short because this guy seems to be normal sized and he is towering over that guy."

"Really? A human in the Shire? That's not normal, what does he look like?"

"I don't know, he's in some sort of Dumbledore like getup, all grey and-"

"Gandalf the Grey! Oh I've heard about him!"

"Alex why have you heard about some dude in another world?" Not to sound repetitive or anything but seriously, how is this my life?!

"I told you, I monitor things. Anyway, this is great, Gandalf can help you out, he's a wizard."

Oh come on, my mind is barely handling this science fiction stuff does there really need to be magic added to the mix?

"Just go out there and tell him the truth." Alex said. As if I had a choice. Between him and the short guy who seemed to be freaking out something fierce, I chose the wizard.

I stepped out of the little house, ducking my head so it wouldn't hit the door frame and walked down the round steps carefully just catching the end of what appeared to be a very heated conversation.

"-I am a Baggins, of Bag-End!" Came the translation in my ear.

Behind him the tall wizard guy's eyes were firmly planted on me and wide as could be. Don't blame him really. Well maybe I do, is the thought of a girl coming out of this Baggins guy really that surprising?

"Umm hello," I said tentatively and the words came out in another language. The short guy turned and looked between me and the Grey guy in shock. "So this might be a bit weird but I'm from another world and I've been told that you're the one I need to talk to about that."


	4. Chapter 4

Bilbo Baggins is either very attracted to me or not used to seeing women of the human variety. I can think of no other reason why he keeps on looking at my fully covered legs with this look of shock before accidentally catching my eye and blushing hard. This has been going on for quite a while now. I suppose if the hobbit women have giant feet too it's quite understandable that he's freaked out by my small feet. To be fair I spent quite a lot of time staring at his feet too though I didn't blush even once. He's shy, I guess. Or a pervert.

"So," I said grabbing his attention. Luckily he didn't blush this time round. "How do you know Gandalf?"

The wizard my brother had recommended had spouted something about auspicious starts to quest and adventures before saying he would be back soon and asking Bilbo to take care of me. Without waiting for an answer he had left.

"Umm, I don't. Not that well really. I've met him on occasion as a Hobbitling when he would come to the Shire for old Took's birthday celebrations with some marvellous fireworks but haven't actually seen him since."

"Really? Because that seemed to be quite a heated discussion you were having with someone who isn't that well known to you?"

He flushed hard. "I'll admit I was a bit rude-"

"No no not rude. Well I'm assuming not, you've been corralled into taking me into your home and you've been quite gracious about it so he must have said something that must have really shocked you."

"He asked me if I'd be looking to partake in an adventure." He said and scoffed.

Yeah that does sound pretty pervy. If a strange old man came up to me and asked me if I'd like to join him in an 'adventure' he'd be getting kneed. Or pepper sprayed, can't quite decide.

"Good on you for saying no to him, I can't believe Alex actually recommended that guy to help me out. I deal with enough creepy perverts at work who think that because I'm a girl-"

"Wait, what? What do you mean pervert?" Then the look of realisation spread son his face. "No! No no he wasn't-that isn't what he meant. Gandalf is a travelling wizard and I've never left the Shire the thought of leaving its borders is ridiculous."

"Oh you meant an actual adventure."

"Yes. A real adventure."

I don't know what it says about me that he says adventure and the first thing I think of is that the old guy is hitting on him. And that has also made this quite awkward.

I cleared my throat. "So what does this adventure he was talking about entail?"

"I didn't ask. No respectable hobbit goes off on adventures." He scrunched up his nose and shook his head. Why don't respectable hobbits go on adventures?

"Oookay. So umm, what can you tell me about Middle Earth?"

"You want to know about Middle Earth?"

"Well yes, I am here and have no idea about it and well, we've got time to kill. Unless you've got something to do I don't want to impose."

"Oh no it's not imposition at all, I have some maps if you'd like to see?"

"Oh yes, that would be lovely."

We spent a lot of time looking at maps and he explained to me what he knew of those places. Seemed to me that for someone who had no intention of travelling Bilbo Baggins was a lot more informed than I expected him to be.

After a few hours or so though, he got up and started buttoning up his coat.

"I'm sorry but I need to go to the markets and fetch supper." He paused at the doorway. "Would you like anything in particular?"

"No I'm fine with anything really, should I go with you?"

"No!" He said loudly before clearing his throat and repeating himself in a quieter voice. "Umm, no that won't be necessary."

Kind of insulting really, if there's one thing I'm good at it's shopping, even food shopping is something I excel in.

"What's going on?" I asked before teasing. "Are you ashamed of me?"

He hesitated which was a pretty clear yes.

"Wait seriously? What's going on?"

"You're too inappropriate to go out in public." He said in a rush.

"What do you mean?"

I was covered from head to toe, knee high boots, proper pants and not just leggings, long tunic and an ankle length coat as well, I even had gloves on because of the snowstorm that had been (falsely) predicted to hit the city. Even for a medieval land I am fully appropriate.

"Not inappropriate exactly but...you're human. People will point and stare and they'll talk about the fact that you're staying at my house. A human Woman hasn't been seen in the Shire for years now especially not here in Hobbiton. In the markets near Southfarthing perhaps, but not here." He was waving his hands around wildly and then pointed at my feet. "You're even wearing shoes!"

So I will be gawked at...for being completely covered.

Interesting.

"So if I walk out of your house then your reputation's ruined?" I interpreted.

"Well, yes. And yours as well."

Apparently I'm going to be Bilbo's dirty little secret.

Kinky.

"I'm sorry, I wish I could change. I don't want to make you uncomfortable in your own house."

"No, no it's just...a bit of an adjustment."

"Well then...I hope you never end up in my world. That might kill you actually."

"Oh, I believe you." He laughed. He's quite good company really. I can understand what Alex meant when he said I was lucky to be dropped into Shire, if the rest are anything like Bilbo their default setting is 'nice'.

"Would you mind if I looked around your house while you're gone? I won't open anything up or root around in your things, I've just never seen a house quite like this."

"Oh please, feel free." With that and a smile he left and I was once again alone in the 'Smial' as Bilbo had called it.

It was very round. Every was rounded, even the table's edge had been sanded into a smooth curve, the windows were round. There were two pantries, one was the open one adjacent to the kitchen and another one nearer to the bedrooms of which there were two. There were a lot of rooms actually, a lot. But everything was on the same floor so it just seemed bigger. From the outside it looked like just a little place, maybe three, fours rooms at best but it was really quite big. Combined with the open plan it felt like walking along the lower deck of a ship actually especially with the round windows.

I'd just about finished my tour of all the places and wound up in the drawing room when he came back. When Bilbo returned he found me in front of the two portraits hanging across from the fireplace.

"Ah here, you are."

"Hello, did you find what you were looking for?"

"I was thinking of having fish for dinner but I know some people don't like it so I got a spatchcock instead." He came forward and stood next to me. "I see you found my parents."

"You look like your mother. "

"Really? Most people tell me I look exactly like my father actually."

"You do but you have her smile."

When I turned to look at him I found him staring at the portraits with a curiously blank look on his face.

"Thank you for saying that."

His voice was a bit thick like he was about to cry so I got nervous. I am not good with emo talks.

"I only said it because it's true." I tried to diffuse it but it only made him weepier and he sniffed lightly.

"Your parents must be worried with you in another world." He said chattily after clearing his throat a couple of times.

"No they're a bit too dead for that."

"I'm sorry."

"Don't be, you didn't kill them after all."

"How did they-?"

"They flew into the sun."

"WHAT?!" People haven't reacted with that much surprise to that piece of information for a while now. My parent's death via spaceship flying into the sun was widely talked about and debated.

"Why would they do that?"

"I stopped trying to figure that out a long time ago."

Mainly because it usually accompanied itself with thoughts like 'Why did they go off to have a dangerous adventure and leave?', 'Why couldn't they just have stayed with us?', or my personal favourite, 'Why weren't Alex and I enough to keep them here?'.

That can of worms has been welded shut. The worms inside of that can are dead and decomposing.

I hate myself for painting that mental picture.

Time flies when you're in another world and helping your host cook. It wasn't long before we had a roast ready and I set the table while Bilbo enumerated on how he'd cooked the chicken. Apparently Hobbit recipes are quite valuable.

And as luck would have it just as we'd finished setting the table up for supper, the doorbell rang. And when I say doorbell I mean an actual bell. I don't know why it struck me as odd but the little trilling sound of that was oddly surreal.

Bilbo frowned but went off to open the door. I followed behind him but hid behind the door in case it was one of his fellow hobbits who would think it weird if he had me there but from what I saw of his face Bilbo was pretty shocked to see whoever it was.

"Dwalin at your service." Came the rumbly voice. It sounded like gravel being run driven over.

"Bilbo Baggins at yours." He turned to look me in the eye confused but turned back to 'Dwalin' just as quickly. "We're just about to have some supper, please come and have some with us."

And then Dwalin stepped in and I could finally see him. He was big, burly and somehow not quite as big because he was actually just about my height, perhaps even shorter. But I was intimidated anyway, not just because of the big strapping shoulders but because he had axes strapped to them. And then there's the half bald, tattooed head. But mainly it was the sharp pointy objects. Probably a dwarf from what I've learnt from Bilbo.

"So I don't suppose Gandalf can magically transform himself and that's actually him?" I asked Bilbo.

"No." He said tightly.

"But he's definitely the one behind this?"

"Yes."

Dwalin's finished the entire roast by himself, Bilbo got just one crummy little cake. This can only mean one thing.

Gandalf is going to get shanked.


	5. Chapter 5

After Dwalin came Balin. The two proceeded to ignore both Bilbo and I, although I wasn't doing much to warrant attention in the first place and began going through the pantry and moving tables and talking about 'others' which had Bilbo squawking.

And then came Fili and Kili who also just shoved into the house regardless of Bilbo's annoyance. On their heels came a whole lot of other dwarves and behind them (finally) Gandalf.

I wanted to talk to him about what exactly was going on and Bilbo definitely wanted to talk to him about why whatever was going on was going on in his house but neither happened.

While it was just Dwalin I was fine, when Balin came in I was okay. Then Fili and Kili came and things snowballed. The translator was trying to keep up and failing and I couldn't quite tell which one was saying what so I gave up on trying to understand. I actually took the ear piece out and sat in the drawing room instead because hearing multiple voices and the translations was giving me quite a headache. Bilbo came in to check on me and I put the earpiece back in.

"I'm sorry but this thing was trying to keep up and didn't. I'm sorry I can't be much help but while they're all talking at the same time it's-"

"Madness. I know. Believe you me I know. I'm going to try to salvage what I can from my pantry and when things clam down I'll call you?"

"Yes please, I do want to help."

"Nonsense you're a guest."

"One might argue that so are _they_."

"..You're a guest that respects the limits of my pantry."

"That makes more sense."

"Now if you'll excuse me, I need to go confront a wizard as to what all these dwarves are doing in my house." He pulled up his pants, girding his loins so to speak and stomped out.

I took the translator out again and began banging my head against a table as they began singing. No clue what exact it was that they were singing about but them dwarves can seriously carry a tune. Not stellar of course, could do with a bit of fine tuning but otherwise good.

Then came The Knock.

I wasn't exactly interested in the knock but the thing was, ever since they'd come in there had been an unending, and when I say unending I mean _unending,_ chatter so of course when they all suddenly stopped talking, I got interested.

Also I'm pretty sure whoever it was, was an idiot. Total utter idiot, there's a door bell right there, why would you knock the door? Especially considering how loud that knock was, whoever this dude was he must have bruised his knuckles trying to get it that loud.

My opinion that this person was an idiot underwent no change when he came in and began speaking.

"Gandalf," He does have a really nice voice though. "I thought you said this place would be easy to find. I nearly lost my way, twice." Doesn't sound like the sharpest tool in the shed. "I wouldn't have found it at all had it not been for the mark on the door."

"Mark, there's no mark on that door, it was painted a week ago."

"There is a mark, I put it there myself." Gandalf said.

Does he even realise that he's basically just copped to vandalism?

"Bilbo Baggins, Lady Alessia, allow me to introduce the leader of our company, Thorin Oakenshield."

"So this is the Hobbit." Thorin said getting all up in Bilbo's face. Poor Bilbo, this has been quite an eventful day for a respectable hobbit who never goes off on adventures. "Tell me Mr Baggins, have you done much fighting." The answer to that is an obvious no. Although, Bilbo does have a good eye, he'd probably make a good marksman if given a gun.

"Pardon me?"

"Axe or sword? What's your weapon of choice?" Thorin walks around Bilbo checking him out.

"Well I do have some skill at conkers, if you must know," Bilbo answers. I get the feeling he thinks that it's a joke but then Thorin folds his arms and it becomes pretty obvious that it isn't a joke and really any answer Bilbo would have given would have been inadequate because compared ot the dwarves he suddenly looks less...just plain less really. "But I fail to see why that's relevant."

"Thought as much. He looks more like a grocer than a burglar." Thorin said and everyone laughed, only it wasn't really that funny. Then he rounded up on me. "And you Miss-?"

"Alessia Medici. And I happen to be a woman which means I know when to ask people for directions so that I don't lose my way, twice."

Apparently I am funnier than he is because I see a lot of people hiding smiles at that, actual natural smiles not just 'The cool kid said something, let's laugh' kind of smiles that Thorin had gotten. "Gandalf made no mention of a woman travelling with us."

"And he's so well known for being loose with information is he?"

He rolled his eyes and went in, the rest following him.

They discussed things, lots of things. I could even keep up with what they were saying but it didn't really mean much to me. I don't know what Ered Luin is, I don't know who Dain is and I don't know why they were there. There was mention of a quest but not about how it was relevant to them being here in Bilbo's Smial.

So instead I paid attention to other things.

Like the way Kili and Fili were staring at Balin, Dwalin and Thorin with unabashed awe. Dori was mothering Ori, I knew how that worked seeing as how I spend a great amount of time doing the exact same thing to Alex and Nori was exchanging glares with Dori for some reason, subtle ones but glares nonetheless. Gloin kept on touching his pockets, all of them, Oin was not half as deaf as he made himself out to be. Bifur understood everything that was going on but didn't answer in Westron, probably because of the axe stuck in his head, Bofur talked to everyone in the same easy way but sometimes his laugh was contrived and Bombur liked food. A lot.

Then there was Dwalin, Balin and Thorin clearly the ones running the show. Dwalin listened to Balin but edged himself towards Thorin and Balin himself was the only one apart from Bofur who was aware of Bilbo and he was certainly the only one aware of me. But even he was angling himself towards Thorin, Thorin was the one they were all waiting on.

And then there was Thorin himself. He spoke fewer words but with great feeling behind them. I could almost understand him before the translation came through. And then there was the fact that other than Balin and Dwalin no one else used his name. Clearly those three went way way back.

But for the most part I was just waiting for Alex to call. He'd already messaged saying he'd found something and he'd call back in a bit but so far nothing so I was just standing there next to Bilbo and listening in on what was going on.

Then there was talking of some chap called Smaug which made that Thorin guy very tense. He stiffened up like someone had shoved a boot up his butt. And that was when things became a bit more clear.

"-Well that would be a reference to Smaug the Terrible. Chiefest and Greatest calamity of our age. Airborne fire breather, teeth like razors, claws like meat hooks. Extremely fond of precious metal."

"Yes I know what a dragon is!" Bilbo said fussily which immediately piqued my interest because I had no idea that a dragon was what they were talking about.

I am a little bit ashamed to say this but I have on many occasions thought of locking my little brother up in a tower surrounded by a moat of lava, guarded by a dragon. Given the lack of dragons in our world, the relatively low availability of towers (they usually come with a 'price on request' tag which in my vast retail experience is never good) and the fact that creating a moat of lava is illegal (I checked) I gave up on this train of thought.

Wonder if Smaug would be willing to come back with me and take care of Alex. I mean there's no tower or moat of lava but one out of three isn't so bad.

"The task would be difficult enough with an army behind us, but we number just thirteen. And not thirteen of the best, nor brightest."

Still no mention of what exactly the task is. I mean I have a vague idea that they're talking of reclaiming a city from a dragon but not why nor how. And more importantly why are they here, why discuss all this in Bilbo's house? I mean I'd understand if they're using it as a safe place to meet considering that from what I've learnt of hobbits, no one's going to care about the information being dropped but it still doesn't make sense not entirely.

And again, chaos and shouting and then Gandalf choking on smoke and then more shouting. Poor Bilbo was looking out the window hoping no one would wake up and desperately trying to get them to calm down when, of course, Thorin gets up and says something in another language and everyone shuts right up.

Then he gives this amazing inspirational speech which would have affected me a lot more if I didn't work in PR and have heard a great deal of great speeches and know that they are often insincere. Then there was the fact that he'd still not mentioned exactly how they would be going about this quest but now at least I know why they're doing it.

'Vast wealth lays unprotected'. Money. Glad to see that some things stay the same even in other worlds. Money is a great motivator.

Crap, I have no money here. This does not seem to be a place that uses paper currency. Maybe I can find some place to trade things? Get Alex to send me stuff through the pocket dimension in my pocket?

There's a pocket dimension in my pocket, why am I thinking of money? I can just get him to send me stuff.

"You forget the front gate is sealed." Thorin sat down at Balin's words, all upset and stuff. "There is no way into the mountain."

And Balin has the right idea again. That guy is probably the one who'll survive this.

"That my dear Balin is not entirely true." Gandalf said and took a key out of somewhere. Thorin stared at it like it held the answers to the mysteries of the universe.

"How came you by this?"

That is the exact same look I get on my face when there's a shoe sale.

"It was given to me by your father, by Thrain for safekeeping. It is yours now."

"If there is a key" Fili said. "There must be a door."

I snorted loudly. "Unless the key was made just to confuse people into thinking there's a door when there really isn't one."

And then they turned to me.

And just as my usual terrible luck would have it, my phone began ringing at that exact moment and then the ruckus began again. Only this time it was aimed at me and had lots of accusations of witchcraft in them. Along with a few of having 'laid with elves'.

Strange. Not as strange as the happenings at the office Halloween party last year but still, strange.


	6. Chapter 6

Yelling ensued. Lots and lots of yelling. I'm not the most patient of people so my response was to whistle very loudly to get them all to shut it.

"I'm from another world, I have nothing to do with any of your quest stuff. So now I'm going to go to the drawing room to talk to my brother and you will continue your discussion. Any questions pertaining to my existence will be answered by Gandalf and/or Bilbo. Continue." I said and before anyone could say anything I shoved out, kind of desperate to take the call.

"Now, Alex, what've you got for me?"

_"I have bad news and good news."_

"Of course you do." It's never just good news for me, no siree it's always a mixture of bad and good, usually tending more to bad.

_"Good news is I've found a way to get you back home that is almost certain to not kill you."_

"Bad news?"

_"Bad news is that it is pretty far away. And transportation being what it is in this world it'll probably take you a year to get there."_

I blinked. A year. To get back home without the threat of death or dismemberment.

"WHAT?!"

_"And umm, the path to get there is pretty dangerous."_

"Why can't you just get me out from here?"

_"Dude, you landed there entirely by accident. Seriously, if it had been one millisecond late or early you would have probably landed inside a brick wall and when I say inside a brick wall I mean inside a brick wall. But I've found a place where there's a naturally occurring wormhole oddly enough. I had noticed readings of that sort before but I wasn't that interested in travelling to Middle Earth so I didn't pay attention to it. Looks like it was active less than twenty years ago."_

"And where is this far off mystical place where I'm supposed to go?"

_"Check your pocket."_

"You know I'm getting pretty tired of the 'check your pocket' shtick."

But I checked my pocket anyway.

_"I put a holographic map in there for you, it's also linked to my satellites so it should point out where you are on it."_

I did so and took out a tablet sized transparent blue sheet with metal trimmings. Not really that surprising, Alex had been working on a holographic projector ever since he'd seen the Avengers movie but there had been an issue with the energy source.

"Wait I thought you hadn't figured out a stable energy source for it? Every time you tried, we had to keep it plugged in constantly and ended up taking down the entire grid, how is it working here?"

_"Oh I worked it out."_ He was hedging. I have seen it before. Nothing good comes out of it.

"How?"

_"Oh you know just-"_

"Alex."

_"...Antimatter battery."_ He mumbled.

"WHAT?!" Had to start pacing. Seriously? "We have talked about this, no explosive substances in the house!"

_"Everything has the capacity to be explosive. I can put an egg in the microwave and have it explode!"_

"Yes but an egg does not have the capability to level an entire city!"

_"I didn't make it, I just figured out the plans and sent them over to CERN. Dude, I'm not that irresponsible."_

"When was this?"

_"Three weeks ago."_

"Wait is that what was in that brown package that you practically ripped out of my hand."

Three weeks ago a delivery had come for Alex that I had to sign for because he was hiding. The second I came back in, he plucked it out of my hand and ran back into his room.

_"Yes, what did you **think** it was?"_

"Porn!"

What else was I supposed ot think when he ran back to his room with it, giggling?!

He spluttered.

_"I have the internet for that!"_

Is it weird that I'm seriously glad because that's a normal thing?

"Okay so what do I do with this thing?"

_"Click on the button on the side."_

When I did that a hologram of a map arose from it. It's like I'm in this weird mixture of sci-fi and fantasy.

I don't like it.

_"The little red dot is you. And the little green dot is where you're supposed to go."_

Which is when I freak out a bit because between the red dot (me) and the green dot (the final destination) are rivers, forest, mountains (huge mountains) more forests and then a lake which looked very very very very big and then finally at the bottom of a mountain the place where I was supposed to go.

"I'm going to kill you." On the inside I am dying. On the outside I am murderous. I suppose this happens to most murderers. "How am I going to get there? Walk? I suppose that's how people travel here, they walk?"

_"That or horseback. Or caravans."_

"Great, that's just great. I don't exactly have money so I can't get a horse and I don't know how to ride one. Maybe I could bike it?"

_"Where would you get a bike?"_

"You could send it to me."

Alex laughed. I was not happy to hear that laugh.

_"The pocket dimension isn't exactly big enough to fit a motorbike."_

"Not a bike bike, a cycle, a collapsible one. That might fit right?"

_"Wait, that would work. I can work on it all night and manage to make a bike that's suitable for off-roading that you could carry too. That's genius."_

The surprise in his voice gets me. I mean it's not the first time that I've had to common sense a solution to a problem of his making. Still I am sceptical at the thought of bicycling my way through a rough terrain. I don't have much experience in cycling. Well I do, but I don't think Spin Class counts.

"And I think I'll probably need climbing equipment for the mountains."

_"You know how to climb a mountain?"_

"No but I have a few months to learn."

_"You can't be serious?"_

"Alex honey, I don't think I have a choice. Now I'm going to talk to Gandalf and see if he can help me figure out the best route to take, I'm sure some of the roads might be unsafe and stuff. I'll call you in a bit, we need to figure out an inventory of things you'll be sending me via the pocket dimension."

_"Okay but oh, keep Gandalf away from anything electronic."_

"What?"

_"Well magic is like a sentient EMP generator. So you should also try to stay away from any place with elves they're super magical, you won't be able to use any devices if you're too close to them and their cities are coated in magic, I can't even figure out a way to add their language to the database because it keeps short circuiting all my stuff."_

"Of course. Great. This is fabulous. I'm going to go now."I went out into the dining room where everyone was standing with a big printout of the map so that it wouldn't just glitch every time Gandalf pointed at it. "Umm Gandalf would you mind helping me out just a bit? I need to plan my route to-" I didn't know its name, I was still referring to it as the green spot in my mind and only now managed to read the name, "-Dale."

"I thought you said you had nothing to do with our quest?" Thorin growled.

"I don't see what Dale has to do with your quest."

Thorin leaned forward pointing at Dale.

"This is Dale."

"Yes."

And then he pointed at the mountain behind Dale. "This is Erebor."

"Son of a- You're telling me that I have to go across mountains, through forests, through vast lakes to the ruins of a city that are a few hundred feet away from a freaking dragon?!"

Shittiest inter-dimensional travel ever. Why couldn't that portal have dropped me in a resort in Hawaii or something?

"As I suspected, young Miss Medici's sudden appearance here has to do with the quest at hand."

"What?!"

This day just gets better and better.

"My dear girl, is it not enough that the destination your brother has given you is the same as that of the quest."

Why is he making it sound so important, I just want to get home.

"No it's not enough. It's irrelevant."

"Erebor is but a stone's throw away from the ruins of Dale, our fates are entwined there is no doubt about it."

"...Highly doubtful."

"What do you call it then, if not fate?"

"Coincidence. Hellish coincidence. And my luck. It only makes sense that when I drop into another world the only way to get back home is to travel over a large distance into dangerous territories, given my luck that makes perfect sense. The very thought of my life being easy is apparently unacceptable to the universe."

"And what would you have the Universe do instead?"

"I would rather it not throw me into another world or give me an easy way back but that could never happen nooo. I hate my life."

Gandalf turned to Thorin and began talking about me as if I wasn't there. "Thorin it is clear to me that it is in her destiny to be the fifteenth member of our company."

"No!" Both Thorin and I shouted.

"We have enough danger sin our path without adding another dependant to that list. The young hobbit will be enough."

What hobbit?

"I have been nominated by Gandalf to be the Burglar for the company." Bilbo explained.

"Bully for you mate. Wait, how much are they paying you for it?"

"Oh right now, nothing. In fact a clause in the contract that they think I haven't noticed," Bilbo looked sideways at Balin, "actually states that they get to commandeer all the pipe weed in my house."

"That's a shitty contract. You must really not want him to go with you to give him that terrible a contract." Thorin flushed.

"The other part of the contract states that he will get up to but not exceeding one fourteenth of total profit, if any." He said smugly.

"But there's no base line. That just sets the ceiling value it doesn't make any mention of the base value. What's the _least_ that he will be getting?"

Then they became rather reluctant to answer.

"You were saying something about a route?" Gandalf interrupted.

"Well yes, I was hoping you could point out the safest routes for me to take and which roads I should avoid, any markers of any sort?"

"Why Dale?" Gandalf asked instead. The man can't stay on point I want one thing and one thing only and that is apparently the one thing he's delaying me in.

"Alex says there's a naturally occurring wormhole there which has been used as recently as twenty years back. He say its the ideal spot to open up the portal."

Gandalf nodded knowingly."Ah I think I remember tales of a fiery piece of star falling into the ruins around fifteen years ago. The people of Laketown took it to be an omen that the dragon had awoken and evacuated the town but when months went by with no sighting of Smaug they returned."

"That would be consistent with the timeline he's given me."

"You're really going there?" Bilbo asked.

"Well kind of have to if I want to get back home."

"But it's dangerous. Especially if you're going alone."

I just shrugged. Frankly it would not be the first time I have been in a precarious situation because of Alex. The last time I had pretty much disguised myself and infiltrated a top secret paramilitary organisation to break Alex out of their prison. There are a lot of countries where I am no longer allowed to enter.

"If I sign the contract, would you let Alessia join us?" Bilbo said which kind of blew my mind.

I had known him for all of one day, that he would go on an adventure that he didn't want to go on, all so that I might travel safely was mind blowing.

And stupid. Very stupid.

"Bilbo, a word in your study."He followed me there. I knew that the dwarves could hear us but I think the illusion of privacy was more important than actual privacy. "Now, what the hell do you think you're doing?!"

He was taken aback. "Miss Medici, I simply meant to-"

"To be chivalrous I get it but it's nuts. You've never been on a journey like this before have you?" He shook his head attesting to the negative. "Well then, first rule of survival, do not stick your neck out for a person you have known for less than a day!"

"But how will you get to Dale?"

"I'll get there even if I have to do it on my own. I am nothing if not adaptable and the way I feel right now I will _burn down anything that stands in my way_." I might have scared him a bit with that because he looked terrified. "Umm sorry about that but the sentiment stands. Besides which I don't know those guys either, who's to say I'll be any safer travelling with them?"

There was a growl from the other room, someone who had been listening in had obvious been offended.

"Well it's true." I directed my words loudly over my shoulder and Gandalf appeared. "You might be serial killers for all I know."

"I can vouch for them." Gandalf said firmly but he was surprised when I snorted. Seriously what did he expect?

"Who's going to vouch for you?"

"Your brother."

"My brother's a naive idiot."

"And yet you are intending to take on an arduous journey on his information."

"I have no choice!"

FUBAR is the only way to describe the situation I am in.

"Look I don't have time for this. I am going to Dale, end of story. Now either tell me if I'll be travelling with you which by the way can only be good for you all because I am nothing if not resourceful and quite used to cleaning up people's messes and keeping them alive. Yes or no?"

Dwalin, Balin and Thorin did some weird eye contact thing and talked in another language but finally nodded.

"Okay then there you go Bilbo, I'm going with them, now you make your decision on your own. Personally if you are going to be going with them, establish a base line of what you're going to get paid. Seriously. And get the pipe weed bit taken out because we both know you love smoking your pipe." Bilbo snorted but nodded anyway. I turned to the rest. "Now, gentlemen-"

"Dwarves."

"Gentledwarves, I am off to plan my packing, you guys can get back to whatever you were doing."

I went to the dining room to prepare an inventory and other important things, Bilbo and Gandalf went into the sitting room and were probably hashing out Bilbo's involvement in the quest and the dwarves went into the dining room and soon began singing a song.

It was kind of soothing actually.


	7. Chapter 7

I was pretty much the only person rushing around that night which I found odd. But then I asked Bofur about it and he said that Gandalf had suggested they come to Bilbo's house successively so that they wouldn't overwhelm Bilbo and so they were all ready from quite a long time ago. The only person who had reached in a more spontaneous manner was Thorin who was apparently so used to travel that within fifteen minutes he was all packed ad done, supposed to be sleeping but instead watching me do my usual freak out during packing.

First thing I made Alex send me was a first aid kit. Let's be honest, if a guy starts off his introduction by asking the other person whether axe or sword is their choice of weapon, you know someone's going to get hurt real bad. There's also the distinct chance that I'll get sick pretty easily because I don't have the same antibodies that the others do, even my vaccines might turn out to be completely pointless here. Then came the clothes, a few baggies of trail mix, a sleeping bag, toiletries and a lighter. The rest would come later on but for now this much would do. Between that and a portable water filter I was set for the next few days.

Now all I had to do was wait for Alex to get me the bicycle and meanwhile do the hardest thing of them all.

Send in my resignation letter. Heartbreak. Utter, sheer heartbreak. Sending in that letter hurt more than breaking up with Aaron did. Which means I should either revaluate the way I handle my personal relationships or my professional ones.

"What are you doing?" Thorin asked. I think it might be because of the weird sob like noise I made.

"Quitting my job and creating dossiers on all the accounts I was in charge of so that whoever gets my job knows where to follow up." Probably George, that butthead has been after my job since he joined the team last year. I hate that guy.

"I see. And what exactly is your job?"

"I work in PR. "

"PR?"

"Public Relations. I don't know about this world but in mine news travels fast and so does information. So, anytime anything happens it doesn't take long for people to start pointing fingers and blaming people. What we do in PR is that we figure out what to say, where to say and whom to say it to so that the blame game stops. Or at least people blame the ones we want them to."

The things I have done, the strings I have pulled, the tightly worded releases that I have put out which addressed nothing at all but implied so much. God, I love my job.

"You manipulate them."

"Pretty much."

"And this is normal?"

"It's normal everywhere, probably even normal here it just hasn't been converted to a job that people can do."

"Indeed."

My phone chirped and I picked it up again.

"Ayo."

" _Check your coat, I sent the bike."_

"Excellent." I said and tilted my head so the phone was caught in between my ear my shoulder and began pulling it out of the pocket. Apparently Alex had modelled the mouth of the pocket after a woman's cervix during childbirth because while it took a few tugs, the bike came out easier than I expected it to.

" _Do you want me to get your SIG?"_ He asked hesitantly. Alex has an aversion to guns. I have a healthy appreciation for them. Not that I'm trigger happy or spend a lot of time at shooting ranges or anything like that but there have been a fair few situations where I have needed my pretty little P229. Of course while it would come pretty useful on this trip, I couldn't very well use it. Everyone here fights with axe and sword and arrows.

"No I might end up breaking this world if I did that."

" _What do you mean?"_

"You studied physics I studied human behaviour. Fact is if anyone in this world sees my gun in action they'll think on how they work. Gandalf as I've heard, makes fireworks, to make that leap from fireworks to gunpowder won't be that hard. I might end up revolutionising the weaponry here to mass destruction level."

" _But it's not safe there."_

"No it's not but if you really want to get me something useful make me that crossbow that Van Helsing used in the movie."

" _That movie was crap."_

"I don't know, I liked her shoes. And his hair was glorious." I looked up for a second to see Thorin staring at me in awe. It was weird. "Hi." I said to Thorin and he jolted.

"May I ask what you are saying?" He asked and I realised that while the translator was turning whatever I said to them into Westron, it wasn't doing that for my talks with Alex, which meant I'd been speaking in English all this time and they hadn't understood a word.

"It's nothing much, my brother's just worrying a bit." I told him and he nodded.

" _Who's that?"_ Alex said into my ear.

"Thorin Oakenshield."

"He's _in my database too, people talk about him and Erebor and Smaug."_

"Well I'm going to be travelling with him and his company. Apparently that place you told me to reach is right next to Erebor and they're going there."

" _Woah, seriously?"_

"Yes. I dropped in on the exact day of their meeting in The Shire if can you believe it."

" _That's amazing, it's like you were meant to be there or something."_

I groaned. "Ugh don't, I already got that whole fate vs. coincidence lecture form Gandalf."

" _Hey let me talk to him!"_

"No."

" _Oh come on, please? I can't talk to Gandalf because he'll make all my stuff go bzzt."_

"So articulate."

" _I'm a scientist not a writer. Come on please?"_

"Fine but I'm putting you on speaker." I put it down on the table and looked up at Thorin. "He wants to speak to you."

"How do I-?"

"Just talk normally, as if he's here." I shrugged. "You're on." I told Alex.

" _Umm hi."_ He said nervously and Thorin jolted at the sound and ignored my presence there entirely, focusing solely on the phone.

Not gonna lie, my ego hurt at that.

" _Please take care of my sister."_ Alex said in his sweet innocent and completely fake voice. Only Thorin fell for it hook, line and sinker.

"I shall endeavour to keep your sister alive but I cannot make any promises." He said all magnanimous and I snorted loudly.

It's just that usually I'm the one keeping people alive.

" _Call me when you start off okay?"_ Alex told me and cut the call. He sounded worried which is just such a role reversal. I cannot put into words how strange it was. I kept on laughing, not because it was haha funny but just weird funny.

"I can't believe you fell for that." I half said, half laughed.

"Fell for what?"

"The whole innocent routine. That is the exact same voice he uses after he screws up and promises never to do it again. And then does exactly what he promised not to do the very next day."

He used that voice the first time he caused a fire in the kitchen. And then burnt down the sofa the next day. All 'accidental' of course but when you get invites to the fire chief's retirement party, you know the fire department way too well. Those guys practically watched us grow up.

"I know what it is like to be the keeper of troublemakers." He said empathetically.

That's a nice way of saying 'I know that feel bro'.

"Whoever your troublemakers are I assure you Alex surpasses them."

"I wouldn't be too sure of that, Fili and Kili can be quite a handful."

"Fili and Kili? You're their older brother?"

"Uncle actually."

"Shut up!" There is no way he is old enough to be their uncle.

"Beg your pardon?" He looked offended and then I realised that perhaps that was not the best way to express my disbelief.

"You don't look old enough for that honestly."

"Indeed? How old do you think I am?"

"I don't know, late thirties? Early forties maybe."

"Fili is eighty two." What?! "Kili is seventy seven." What?! "And I am one hundred and ninety five." WHAT?!

"Holy mother of God. My Nonna's recipe book isn't that old and it's been passed down to her from her great grandmother! Wait if you're that old, how old is Gandalf?"

He frowned thoughtfully."I do not think anyone knows. He has simply always been around."

That's creepy.

"I would suggest you get some sleep Miss Medici, we leave at dawn."

I laughed only he didn't laugh and I realised he was serious.

"Wait, dawn?! That's just an hour or so away!"

He snorted smugly."Which is why you should get some sleep."

And I did so at the table seeing as how pretty much every other space in the house was taken. I did not sleep much. Or deeply. Or comfortably. Frankly I've had better sleeps on the subway.

And within what seemed to be a few minutes I was woken up when Bombur put a stew down a bit away from my head, apparently for breakfast and everyone began eating happily. Even I ate properly which is weird because I usually just have a grapefruit for breakfast. Still, I think I'll be burning the calories off pretty quickly so I just shoved in mouthfuls of food.

"So," Kili said. " Lady Sia-"

"Alessia actually but yeah you can call me Sia, I guess."

"Right, Lady Sia, what's this world of your like then?"

"I don't know how to describe it. I mean to you, the Shire isn't exactly like your home is it?"

He snorted. "No, we live in the mountains."

"So technically _this_ is weird for you as well." He shrugged. "Well I guess my world is a bit more artificial? And there's a lot more people as well. Lots of tall buildings, structures, even the bit of green we have form the trees is more contrived and planned than anything else but that's mainly because it's a city, if you go out to the countryside it's a lot like this I guess. And it's mechanically advanced so transport is easier. It's different but still a variation on a fixed theme more than anything else."

I'm sure there's plenty of outdoorsy people who'd fit in here just fine. This place is probably just weird for me because I've lived in a city for most of my life. Sure the Dwarves and elves and hobbits thing is a bit weird but I can think of it as a sort of evolution. I mean it's not like they're green with giant bulbous black eyes like the aliens from the movies. _That_ would be really weird.

And then after a bit more exchange of talk and a 'bath' using a rag and a little washbasin we were off.

"Wait! Waaait!" Bilbo's voice rang out and while we all stopped, I exchanged a victorious look with Gandalf. I had traded one use of the pocket dimension for anything from my world (nothing electronic though) for ten coins and then proceeded to bet all of them on Bilbo joining us for the journey. Now I had fifty coins in total which according to Gandalf would allow me to buy one set of clothes, a small weapon, food for a good month and passage in a trade caravan (but only from Bree to the base of The Misty Mountains) which seemed like a pretty nice amount really.

Not having money of my own was bothering me. I don't really know the Dwarves, don't know when I might be on my own again, having that little safety net allows me to relax a bit more.

"Bilbo!" I said once he'd finished handing the contract over to Balin. "Finally, I was just keeping your pony warm for you."

I dismounted and he grew nervous.

"Pony? No thank you, I'll manage fine walking besides I don't want the Lady Alessia to be left on foot."

"Oh no I won't be on foot. I have my own ways of travelling."

I really wanted to get off the pony. I do not like having something with a head of its own in between my legs.

Must remember never to say that out loud.

"Are you certain?" Thorin asked but I waved him off instead taking the bicycle out.

"Yes yes, go on ahead, I'll catch up easy peasy."

After a few seconds of dithering they finally left and with a hella lot of glee I set about constructing the bicycle. It was easier than I thought it would be and I spent more time figuring out how to attach my bag to the rear rack than I did putting the bicycle together. I have ordered furniture form Ikea that was harder to put together than the bicycle.

And then I was off. Cycling through a medieval land with proper protective gear on which made me look stupid. Although I suppose I must have looked stupid anyway seeing as how I was on a bicycle and they're not exactly common here.

Nothing compares to how stupid the others looked, gaping as I came up from behind them, weaving through the trees and left them in the dust though.

Priceless.


	8. Chapter 8

Travelling via bicycle is tiring. Seriously tiring. I could barely move myself to get my sleeping bag out, I almost slept on the forest floor itself. The Dwarves found it funny but then they hadn't been pedalling for hours. No they just sat on their ponies, which is back ache inducing (from what I heard from Bilbo) but it isn't as exhausting as bicycling is. But the terrain we were going through was pretty easy to navigate which is good because it took some time to get sued to the bike. Still by the time we were two weeks into our journey I had gotten used to manoeuvring it and had stopped accidentally getting the bike into a little ditch or whatever. It took a few dozen times of nearly falling off the bike straight over the handlebars but I learnt to control it better.

I won't be BMX-ing or anything but I can get myself around easy enough.

The worst part though is that the horses get incredibly skittish around the bike. I suppose they aren't used to seeing things like it like the horses back home are but it makes it difficult to keep up with the guys because it's not really keeping up as much as it is travelling at a safe distance. At time I could hear them laughing, clearly cracking jokes and got super jealous.

But I got to know them better around the camp fires while having the stew that had become the everyday fare.

(Bombur tends to overdo it with the pepper but no one dares to tell him that.)

That we had left the Shire and its surrounding lands became obvious when all the small hills turned to small mountains and the evenly spaced out trees turned dense. And the weather changed too as the air became muggier, more humid and even the nights which had been cold enough to allow for snuggling into the sleeping bag turned into using a stone as a pillow because it felt cooler. Between that and the guard shifts everyone took (except for me and Bilbo) because there were suddenly Dangers, no one was sleeping well.

Bombur on the other hand was snoring much less due to this change and slept much better. Instead of the usual much louder snores that had quite honestly become my lullaby, he was having almost soft little drawn out snores although the moths were still present. Fili and Kili who were on watch were talking, even Bilbo was tossing and turning. No one was sleeping a deep sleep as such. Thorin was actually sleeping upright leaning against a rock. Either he was really tired or he had that supernatural ability some people have to fall asleep anywhere. I've always been jealous of those people.

I hadn't slept that entire night. My phone was still getting messages and Penny, a work colleague (although it's ex work colleague now) sent me a message saying that George got butt implants and I was horribly annoyed at having missed that so I was playing Candy crush while hoping and praying that she took a picture of them and sent it to me. Finally Bilbo gave up trying to sleep and just up and went, hopping away to the ponies. He may have been allergic to horse hair but he'd gotten very fond of his pony and not that fond at all of the Dwarves. I don't know if the dwarves were such bad company or if the horses were good company.

A rather loud screech was heard then and dearest Billy Boy turned around in surprise.

"What was that?"

"Orcs." Kili said gravely. That was weird in itself, he's never serious. Even when Dwalin and he were practising sword fights and he got knocked flat on his back he was grinning.

"Orcs!" Bilbo pretty much pranced closer to the fire. It reminded me of the ballet lessons I used to take.

Damn Mademoiselle Colette and her stupid exercises. I am so glad I never have to do an arabesque again.

"Throat cutters." Fili said still puffing away at his pipe far too calmly for someone who'd just said 'throat cutters'. "There'll be dozens of them out there. The Lone-lands are crawling with them."

Kili gesticulated with his hands. "They strike in the wee small hours when everyone's asleep. Quick and quiet, no screams. Just lots of blood."

And then while Bilbo looked terrified they began laughing.

"Are you making up these Orc things?" I asked. "Or do they really exist?"

"Ugly things they are," Kili said, "Red bulbous eyes, they look like a person who's been twisted and corrupted until they don't look human anymore. Sickly grey skin and a bloodthirst that rivals none. They kill for the sake of killing, for the feel of the blood running down their-"

"You think that's funny? You think a night raid by Orcs is a joke?" Man I wish I could learn how to scold Alex the way Thorin scolds those two. My method of taking away caffeine is more effective but still if I could get him to feel all ashamed just by saying words, that would just be a huge relief.

"We didn't mean anything by it."

"No you didn't. You know nothing of the world."

If Thorin's nearly two hundred and still young-ish (taking Balin as an example of old) then Kili might actually know nothing of the world. Maybe in Dwarf terms he's younger than I am.

"Don't mind him, laddie. Thorin has more cause than most to hate Orcs." Balin consoled the two. "After the dragon took The Lonely Mountain King Thror tried to reclaim the ancient Dwarf kingdom of Moria."

"Wait what do you mean _King_ Thror? I thought Thror was Mr Oakenshield's grandfather."

"He was."

"But he's King?"

"Yes."

"So technically most of you are royalty?!"

"Well not all of us but yes a fair few."

"Wow." King. Royalty. Monarchies. Wow. "Umm sorry for interrupting, you were saying something about reclaiming some ancient kingdom."

"Moria had been taken by legions of Orcs, led by the most vile of all their race: Azog the Defiler. The giant Gundabad Orc had sworn to wipe out the line of Durin. He began by beheading the King. Thrain, Thorin's father, was driven mad by grief. He went missing. Taken prisoner or killed we did not know. We were leaderless. Defeat and death were upon us. That is when I saw him."

Balin's eyes had gone hazy, he was looking at Thorin but quite obviously lost in his own memories and not really present in the present.

"A young dwarf prince facing down the pale Orc. He stood alone against this terrible foe, his armour rent, wielding nothing but an oaken branch as a shield. Azog the Defiler learnt that day that the line of Durin would not be so easily broken. Our forces rallied and drove the Orcs back and our enemy had been defeated. But there was no feast nor song that night, for our dead were beyond the count of grief. We few had survived and I thought to myself then, ' _There_ is one who I could follow. _There_ is one I could call King.'"

"And the Pale Orc? What happened to him?" Billy boy asked and Thorin answered. I wonder how he must have felt, listening to Balin talk about him like he wasn't even there. Sure it was all complimentary stuff but that's sometimes harder to deal with. Especially considering that Balin had pretty much imposed these huge expectations on Thorin that the rest of the Company had also begun to have.

"He slunk back into the hole whence he came. That filth died of his wounds long ago."

Balin and Gandalf shared this weird look that I didn't want to think upon too much so I went up to Thorin's nephews instead.

"Why didn't you know already? I mean he is your uncle and Thror is your great grandfather so wouldn't you have known this?"

Fili and Kili looked at one another and Fili was the one who answered. "It is an unspoken rule not to talk of the Battle of Azanulbizar in our home."

"Greta grandfather Thror died but he wasn't the only member of the line of Durin to fall. Our uncle Frerin died as well, long before our births but mother and Uncle grieve for him more than their grandfather really."

"That sucks." But then I turned to Balin. "So do you guys live in Moria now?"

"No it is still infested with Orcs and goblins."

That must really suck. I mean to lose your family like that in a battle, to win it but still not really win it. The battle sounds more like they didn't lose rather than a victory.

Sad.

* * *

So that humidity I was talking about? It turned into a cloud which promptly burst over our heads into heavy showers. And then the inevitable happened.

I got sick.

Just a fever really and it wasn't even unbearably high but enough that I was too exhausted to bicycle it anymore. Eventually they just put me on the back of Bilbo's pony and we carried on. I was feeling so out of it I didn't even protest when I was pretty much thrown on top of his pony like luggage. Bilbo was feeling pretty uncomfortable because I'm tall enough that his head reaches around my chin so I fell asleep almost immediately just using his head as a pillow. It made him pretty damn grumpy, I even heard him being a wee bit mean to Gandalf in a passive aggressive way. Something about great wizard and stuff, I don't know I was pretty out of it. I continued to remain quite out of it even as the rain stopped the next day but apparently I wasn't the only one feeling the strain of travel.

Thorin had called for a stop in the afternoon at an old structure that was kind of like a farmhouse which was pissing Gandalf off quite a bit. I tried paying attention to their fight but the little herb tonic thingy that Oin had given me was making me feel terribly sleepy. Oin told me to get some rest and kind of pushed my towards a certain part of the farmhouse that still had something resembling a roof and I gladly conked off to sleep.

But the sleep I had was not fun. I guess I was having a strange fever dream. The wood beams above my head were growing angry faces and mouths, all black and hollow and I dreamt that they kept on bending down, trying to eat my nose.

So when Gandalf shoved me awake I was quite glad.

"Where are the rest?" He asked urgently

"What?" I croaked out. What was he talking about?

"The company is not here!" He said in loud whispers.

"They aren't?" I looked around to find that Gandalf was right, apparently they weren't there. The fire had burnt out, the bed rolls were still rolled up, the weapons and the dwarves were gone. "When did that happen?"

Gandalf just shook his head and took off. I'd like to say that I didn't immediately go off to sleep but that would be a lie.

When I woke up next, Bilbo was standing over my head shaking my shoulder fiercely.

"Wake up!"

"Why what's going on?"

"We have to go, Radagast is creating a diversion but we'll need to move fast to avoid Orcs."

"Who's Radagast?" I asked but moved sluggishly towards my bags and followed Bilbo. And then I noticed the little sword thing he had. "Where'd you get that from?"

"Troll hoard."

"Troll? Hoard? What?"

"No time to explain, we have to go now!" And then after last turn I saw the company. Standing in front of a dude with bird crap down his face and giant rabbits pulling a sleigh. Christmas here must be epic if that's their Santa Claus.

Epically strange that is.

And then he took off and we watched. After a bit of loud whooping on Radagast's part, these giant wolves with riders who had weird grotesque faces straight out of a horror movie chased him and when they went a bit out of range we began running.

And by running I mean _running_.

Luckily the sight of the Orcs had me all adrenalin-ed up and I was running too. Blindly and tripping a bit here and there but still keeping up with the rest. It was pretty bad. We ran in one direction, Radagast came tumbling there and then the Orcs followed so we went the other way but then the same thing happened again. And then somehow, one of them was right on top of us and we were all being ridiculously quite to stay alive. From a certain angle I could see right at him, up his nose even (it was snotty) and it was weird. He had human features but they were distorted. Half his face was grey the other half a puce coloured yellow and his mouth seemed to be torn and stretched over his face. One minute I was studying him and the next he was tumbling over my head, an arrow sticking out of him and the wolf but neither were dead and then in this display of utter savagery, the dwarves converged on him, axes and all until finally he was dead but not before screaming very loudly and getting us a lot of unwanted attention.

We began running again but now they weren't distracted by Radagast and soon we were surrounded. The adrenaline that was the only thing keeping me up and about was fading and the crash that came after that was utterly exhausting. I was stumbling this way and that and finally just stopped, walking towards a rock to just lean against it for a while when I tripped and fell, sliding down a smooth boulder and jolting my left ankle terribly.

"Gandalf!" I cried out knowing that he was the one closest to me, I'd seen him head for this island of rocks while the others were forming a perimeter of sorts. He peered down to where I was and I figured he was going to help me but instead he went back and yelled to the others.

"This way you fools!" He said and then all of a sudden there were dwarves and hobbit raining down upon me.

"How is getting trapped in a corner any better than being out there?!" I yelled but instead of answering me he shushed me and looked up at the sound of horns. Screams and that terrible wet sound of something sharp meeting flesh filled the air and then before we knew it this other Orc came tumbling down into the little cave only an arrow sticking out of his neck.

I don't mean to sound concerned about the Orcs but why don't they wear armour?

Thorin picked it out of the dead body and threw it away just as quickly. "Elves."

I guess my enemy's enemy is my friend does not work around here.

"I cannot see where the pathway leads. Do we follow it or not?"

"Follow it of course." Bofur said and we began walking again. Well at least it wasn't running and with Gandalf supporting me because of my bad way I had landed on my leg, I was even walking fine, right in between him and Bilbo at the back of the pack.

Bilbo was looking around quite seriously, a little frown on his face. While that wasn't exactly unusual this was more of a curious frown, like he was trying to figure out something. It's the same face I make when I've forgotten something and can't remember what I've forgotten.

"Gandalf, where are we?"

"You can feel it?" Gandalf said and they stopped with me slumped over against the rock.

"Yes, it feels like...Well, magic."

"That's exactly what it is. A very powerful magic."

"But magic means all my tech will go on the fritz." I whined. I get whiny when I'm sick.

"Ah but this magic also means a place to rest my dear child, and rest will do you good, don't you agree?"

I thought it over. Alex had said to avoid magic-y places but he didn't say that they were dangerous or anything.

"Ugh fine, but I'm not happy about this." I wagged my finger in his face but with the lethargy it was more like tried to wag my finger in his face. But I tried and failed and then we went out anyway and stopped dead at the sight of this gorgeous city that sat on top of multiple waterfalls

"The valley of Imladris. In the common tongue it is known by another name."

"Rivendell." Bilbo said and I realised that this was one of those places that Alex's equipment had gone nuts around so he couldn't collect any data about it.

They were talking again, very angrily arguing too but I had gotten distracted and was near tears.

"What's the matter Ally?" Bilbo was the only one who had taken to calling me that and I pointed.

"Stairs." I whined. "Lots of stairs. Ugh just put me into a barrel and roll me down it."

But instead we walked again. I thought the bike was exhausting, all this walking and running was much worse.

Sometime halfway down the stairs after the millionth time I stumbled Gandalf pulled me onto his back for a piggyback ride. After that I don't remember much, everything became a sleepy blur. I do, however, remember at one point saying 'Pretty horsey' and petting Gandalf's head which is strange because he's not pretty really. Or a horse . Then the elves came and in my sleep induced haze I thought I could talk to them in French. And when I say French I mean the lyrics of that dirty French song I know. It's a good thing that the elves can't speak French, I don't think I would have endeared myself to them by telling them to take off their shirts. Or maybe I would have, maybe they're exhibitionists, who knows.

Vaguely I recall shouting and horses hooves clattering and then again lots of stairs. But what I remember most clearly is the feel of a really soft bed that I was laid down on and the cloth of cold water that was put upon my forehead just before I was finally allowed to sleep again.

* * *


	9. Chapter 9

When I drifted back to consciousness the first thing I heard was voices speaking in Elvish. Strange language that, the syllables flow but they also stop suddenly. For a language with so many hard consonants it was surprisingly soft. All in the delivery I suppose.

But I didn't understand it and hearing people talk without me understanding them was scary so I pretty much jolted awake, jack knifing off the bed. I ended up leaning back again because that had given me quite a head rush but otherwise I felt much better. Less tired, less cold, more hungry. A lot more hungry.

I opened my eyes and saw this pretty boy standing over my head with better hair than mine. I need to wash my hair. I need to wash myself in general.

"Milady, how do you feel?"

"Grubby and inhuman. Wait how long have I been here? It hasn't been days has it because that would be annoying."

He smiled with tired amusement. "You have only slept through the night, the sun is only just breaking over the horizon."

"Right."

And awkward silence ensued.

I do not know how to interact with people in this world at all. I mean dropping in on random people you've never met before is just plain rude and I've done that on Bilbo and now the elves as well. How do you talk to someone when you've pulled a Goldilocks?

"I should probably go look for my...companions." We travelled together for a month but that doesn't exactly make us friends. I knew Bilbo, Kili, Fili, Gandalf and because of my stint in sickness, Oin as well, but other than that they were all but unknowns to me.

"Are you certain? You do not feel too tired for it?"

"Not as lethargic as I thought I'd be, really mister-?"

"I am Lindir, Lord Elrond's steward." He said and bobbed into a bow.

"That's nice. Who's Lord Elrond?"

"He is the Lord of Imladris."

"Ah the host. Right. Thank you for taking care of me. I hope I can repay your kindness sin some way" He smiled graciously and bowed his head again. "Not to be too rude but where are my things if you don't mind me asking?"

"Ah your bags were taken by your companions."

"And my companions-?"

"Haven't awoken yet." He said with a hint of relief in his voice. Dwarves do not make good guests if the proceeding sat Bilbo's house are anything to go by.

"Okay, great."

I wanted to ask if I could take a bath but that sounds weird.

You don't exactly show up at someone's house and ask to have a bath right? Then again you don't show up to someone's house if you don't know them. But from what Gandalf said about Imladris, it was the last Homely House and they were famous for their healers, maybe that's why they helped me. Their version of a Hippocratic oath perhaps?

I had no idea what the protocol was for all this but I was rubbing at my face and my dilemma must have shown because Lindir spoke up after the awkward silence first started.

"Perhaps you would prefer to take a bath and make yourself more presentable for the day?"

"Yes!" I all but shouted and he looked amused.

Lindir is cute. Even though his name makes me think of Lindor and that makes me think of chocolate which I miss quite a lot. Haven't had it in weeks.

I was led to the bathhouses which were basically giant hot springs, only artificial ones and Lindir directed someone to help. I protested because I am not comfortable with people being there while I'm getting naked but he made a point in that they didn't want me to faint while in the bath and drown myself.

Then I got to wear a pretty dress which swirled around my feet (I was told rather amusedly that it was actually for the equivalent of an elf-teen) and finally felt like I had actual skin and not just dirt and sweat mixed together into a paste covering my flesh which was all kinds of awesome.

The gown was a pretty pale blue with tiny silver embroidery all over and long sleeves but the best part was that even though it was really light and thin it felt ridiculously warm and cosy. Like my favourite sweater and the best hugs all rolled up into one.

After thanking Lindir rather enthusiastically, much to his amusement, I set about looking for the others and got distracted.

You see, Rivendell as it turns out is kind of like a meditation retreat. It's so calm and quiet and peaceful. I had found myself a spot where I could just sit in the lotus position and breathe in and out, chill out. The time we spent travelling, sometimes there was silence but it was never really peaceful. There was always something to do, something to prepare, some undercurrent of tension.

About half an hour into my meditation session I could sense that someone was sitting in front of me. It reminded me of what Alex used to do he'd just be quiet and wait for me to open my eyes and be surprised. Or pop up from behind me and say boo. This person was just quietly watching me. I only really knew they were there because it felt warmer because they were blocking the wind.

I felt them get closer and closer until I could almost feel their breath and then I opened my eyes and said boo loudly.

It was a little boy and the second I had shouted he leapt back with a yelp, his eyes practically falling out of his sockets and I couldn't help but burst into obnoxious laughter. Haven't laughed in weeks, sleeping for more than twelve hours has clearly done me well.

"Sorry, I couldn't resist." I said in between giggles and he began breathing normally only to glare at me.

"That wasn't funny."

"It was from where I was sitting. Are you really telling me you weren't going to surprise me?"

"No I wasn't, I just wanted to know what you were doing."

"Really?"

"Really!"

"Alright then, I'm Alessia Medici, call me Ally."

"I'm Estel."

"Estel is a girl's name back home."

He scowled. "I'm not a girl."

"I know. Just saying. Actually I worked with an Estelle on a project." He was still pouting so I tried to cheer him up. "I'm sure Estel means something great like a warrior or I don't know great king maybe."

And he drooped even more. "My name means hope."

"Well...You can always change it later on. Or get a new one. Maybe you can get people to give you nicknames."

"What nickname would you give me?" He tilted his head adorably. I wanted to squish his cheeks.

I really miss Alex. I haven't been away from him this long my whole life.

"Hmm. Albus maybe?"

He blinked. "...Let's stick to Estel."

"See now I want to name you Alec. You know, for smart aleck."

"Thank you for thinking me smart milady." He bowed. Everyone in this world is more graceful than I am.

"Cute. Real cute." And then in a move that I usually only pull with Alex when I want to embarrass him because I don't really like touching people especially strangers, I put my arm around Estel's shoulders. "Come on _Alec_ , show me Imladris. And help me find my friends, you might have noticed them, they're dwarves and one hobbit."

"What's a hobbit?"

"Short, big feet, no shoes."

"Like the one talking to Ada there?" He pointed up at a balcony where Bilbo wa stalking to an elf.

"Good eyes Albus."

"I thought you named me Alec."

"Do you prefer Alec?"

He nodded furiously.

"Then Albus it is." I grinned.

He rolled his eyes and turned to leave. "I have to go to my lessons, bye crazy lady."

"Bye Albus!" I snickered all the way up to the balcony where Bilbo was.

I reached just in time to catch the end of what the elf was saying.

"You are very welcome to stay here if that is your wish."

"You're thinking of staying here?!"

Bilbo was thinking of staying here? But he's my favourite, he's my homeboy, my anchor.

"Ally! You're awake!" Bilbo rushed towards me.

"Well yes, I couldn't sleep forever now could I? But what's this I hear about you staying here?" I turned to the elf. "And no offense but do you really have the authority to extend such an invitation? Doesn't it have to be cleared with Lord...oh I've forgotten the name."

"Was it perhaps Elrond?" the elf said amusedly.

"Yes that's what Lindir said."

Bilbo cleared his throat. "Ah, Lady Alessia Medici, I'd like to introduce you to our host, Lord Elrond."

"But Estel said you were Ada."

"I see what confused you. Ada is simply a way of addressing one's father."

"You're Estel's father?"

"Adopted."

"Oh."

"You met Estel?"

"Yes but he said he had to go for his lessons. How did you manage to get him to be so well behaved? I can't manage to get Alex to listen to me without shouting."

Elrond smiled. "Estel is a special case. You should meet Elladan and Elrohir, my older sons. They require a lot more than just words to obey me."

Someone said something in Elvish from behind me and I turned to see Lindir whose eyes were trained on Elrond and looked worried and after exchanging a few words they went off in a rush.

"Come on, I imagine our friends are awake now." Bilbo said and led me down one way while Lindir and Elrond went the other. He took me to a terrace which had all the signs of a camp being set up with my bags among the many there, the bicycle folded and attached to it with cords like I'd kept it. I went through everything making sure it was there ignoring Bilbo's sceptical look. "We haven't touched a thing you know."

"I know I'm just...checking."

"You don't trust us?"

"It takes me years to trust a person. Which is probably why I have no friends. Well except you, I trust you for some unknown reason. I think it's because you're the only sensible one here apart from me and Balin. I mean Gandalf is nice but whatever he's smoking is clearly...well you know."

He laughed at that. "You missed out on quite a bit."

"Yes, I meant to ask you about that, what was all that with the giant rabbits pulling the sleigh and where'd the Orcs come from and where'd you get the sword?"

"You mean the letter opener?" He shook his head.

"What?"

"At dinner, Balin said that my sword was more letter opener than sword, that it hadn't seen any battle."

"Have you opened any letter with it?"

"No."

"Then it's not a letter opener. It's a sword."

"Still, it is quite small."

"Well then it's a dagger at most, definitely not a letter opener. Now where exactly did you get it?"

He began telling the story and sometime during it, the others had come back. They all took turns telling the story, everyone adding things that they'd suddenly remembered or arguing over who did what, who was brave and who cowered . Part of me is really quite glad that I missed out on the trolls bit. The other part wants to double back and see their petrified remains. Needless to say the sensible part of me smothered the stupid part of me quite violently.

"Well, well, you all had quite an adventure. And Bilbo here rescued you all it seems."

"It was Gandalf's doing really." Bilbo said modestly.

"Nonsense, sounds like you were the only one who was paying attention to what they were saying. Although next time, I'd suggest venturing into the forest with a knife already on you."

"True, might have saved us a whole lot of trouble if I had."

"But you probably ended up saving a lot of the people in the villages they were bound to terrorise."

"Yes I believe so. I just wish we'd arrived in time to save the farmer whose house's ruins we stayed in." Bilbo said, subdued. "I can't forget what that one troll was saying about picking bits of leathery old farmer out of his teeth." He shuddered and everything grew a bit quiet again.

"So that's all then right? Did anything else happen while I was out?"

"Well...not exactly." Bilbo started and looked to Thorin.

"We found out more about the map." Kili said but Thorin threw him this look as if he shouldn't be telling me things. I could be offended but I'm not really. After all it's their quest, I'm just tagging along. He can keep whatever secrets he wants to.

"You don't have to tell me. Well unless it affects my travel plans in which case I'd like a heads up. I just want to know if I'm going to be travelling on my own."

"Well...?" Kili looked at Thorin who rolled his eyes but began talking anyway.

"The elves are not happy that we are trying to get into Erebor. They may try to stop us."

"Why though?"

"Lord Elrond believes we will awaken the dragon."

"Well of course you will, it's Murphy's law. The same law that has quite obviously been applying to us our whole trip."

"Murphy's law?"

"Anything that can go wrong will go wrong. I mean let's face facts things have been pretty eventful even though I missed out on a lot of events. But I was afraid I'd fall sick and I did, you did not want to end up at Rivendell and here you are. Radagast was supposed to pull the Orcs away but they found us anyway. You might have gotten away with no encounter with the trolls if we'd just not camped there but it happened anyway. Now I'm not saying that there were wrong decisions here but clearly we should expect the worst."

"You think Smaug will awaken."

"Hell yes. I don't want him awake, you don't want him awake, the Elves don't want him awake. So he will definitely wake up."

"So you think we should leave be? That we shouldn't try to take back our lands, our-" I interrupted Thorin because he was getting far too melodramatic. Dude needs to smoke whatever it is Gandalf is smoking.

"No I didn't say that. He's going to wake up anyway, obviously. I mean like you said about the portents and stuff, if not you someone else will try to take the gold there which means that someone _will_ wake him up. There's no getting around it and let's face facts, Gandalf did not expect the trolls, he did not expect the Orcs. Now if what you're saying about them being the hand fo dark forces is true, then that implies that something is giving them that confidence to move out of whatever hidey hole they come from. I mean are Orcs usually seen in these parts?"

"No the elves protect these borders."

"But they came anyway. And that is especially worrisome when if I consider what you said about Azanulbizar. A lot of them were killed then and they were driven back. So where are they coming from? What's their new stronghold? Frankly if anyone it should be you going on this quest. Not because I think you deserve the gold and all that but because you hate that dragon for killing so many of your people. That means you're much less likely to form an alliance with him."

"Why would anyone form an alliance with a dragon?" Bofur snorted.

"Someone like me would." They literally jumped back in revulsion ad I rolled my eyes. "Look honestly, he breathes fire, clearly terrifies you all, he flies so that makes it easy to access a lot of places with him. Plus he has gold which I could use to buy the loyalties of armies. Logically he'd make a great ally."

"You can't be serious?" Balin asked. "We cannot allow you to accompany us if this is what you have in your mind."

"I just pointed out why anyone would want to form an alliance with a dragon not actually me. I just want to go home. Besides which there's no reason why _he_ would form an alliance with me, I've got nothing to bring to the table. I don't even have information because this world is not mine. This is all hypothetical, all I'm saying is that you are the best possible team of people who should be going to the Lonely Mountain, that's all."

It took a few moments for my words to sink in and I could see their thoughts flying across their faces but eventually they saw what I meant.

"You're very cold in the way you see things." Thorin said. "No sentiment, no passion."

"I know. My ex said that and I'm starting to see what he meant."

Fact is I expect them to screw me over at some point or another. There's nothing tying us together in this journey. I mean Bilbo has a contract at least, he has a role they expect him to fulfil. I'm little more than a drain of resources they have no reason to stick around. As soon as we get out of here, I'm getting Gandalf to use his favour and get something out of the pocket dimension and just go my own way. It's a bit exhausting waiting for them to ditch me.

Man, I have trust issues like the Amazon has water.

* * *

Billy boy and I had taken to roaming Imladris on our last day there before we'd sneak out late at night as per the plan. He just wanted to see it all, breathe in the air and take in all those trees and the peace and tranquillity but I on the other hand was carefully cataloguing all of it for Alex.

This is a place he can't learn of using his science so he'll want to hear about it from me. I was learning everything about it, all the stories about all the murals, that broken sword on display, the story of the Silmarillion, everything. And I also did some research into the creatures of Middle Earth. Really hope we don't come across that Balrog chap.

And that's how we ended up overhearing Gandalf and Elrond's conversation. It was late in the night or early in the morning of the day we were supposed to sneak out of Imladris so we weren't sleeping most of us. Bilbo had heard about some flowers in a certain balcony that bloomed only at night and their petals were sued in distilling a paralytic when treated with the oil from the seeds of the same plant and so there we were and there was Elrond discussing Gold Sickness in Thorin's blood or something like that.

I felt shitty just listening to Elrond talk about Thorin, it got worse when we found out that Thorin was right behind us.

On the one hand accusing someone of following in their ancestor's footsteps is never nice but on the other Gold Sickness seems like a legit mental illness. And it is one that Dwarves are prone to anyway, not just Thorin so it might be possible that he is genetically more susceptible to the Gold Sickness as is made obvious from his family's medical history.

But this is also Magic and stuff so perhaps applying rules of medicine from my world won't work?

Thorin looked like he was about to cry. I would rather be awake to face trolls than deal with tears so I tried to defuse the bomb.

"Don't worry, if you get the Gold Sickness we can deal with it."

"Indeed?" He sounded less like he wants to cry (although he still looked it) and more like he wanted to laugh.

"I'll conk you over the head."

"And here I thought you'd ask your brother to find a cure."

"That's not as fun."

"Not as fun as hitting me over the head?"

"Hey, you said it not me."

He laughed. Well, it more like an amused wheeze but he laughed and there was a distinct smile (I didn't know he could _do_ that!) and apparently Thorin Oakenshield has dimples. I'm a sucker for dimples.

"It is good to know that I have your well wishes and your concern."

"And a good blow to the head. I'm thinking of it as a giant red reset button."

"I do not know what you mean."

"Well now you know how I feel half the time when I'm listening to you. You talk about places but I don't know they're places and think they're people, you talk of battles I think they're some epic love poems, you talk about –"

"I get it."

"The sad thing is you think you do but you don't. I wonder what it would have been like if you were the one in my world."

"I imagine I would manage fine."

"And I imagine you'd be screwed. Seriously screwed. People aren't kind for the sake of kind in my world. They'd want something in return and while you're quite lovely you wouldn't know how to be capable in my world."

"I've never heard myself described as lovely before."

"Out of everything I said _that's_ what you heard?"

Men. Or well, dwarves.


	10. Chapter 10

There are three things about Imladris that I miss intensely.

Firstly, of course, Estel/Albus/Alec. Dude was funny and cool once he loosened up a bit. For the first time in my life I was the one corrupting someone. It's usually me stopping others from corrupting people. For some reason when Elrond heard about me giving Estel another name he began laughing really loudly and said that Estel was getting a head start in his names. It didn't make much sense to me but Gandalf said that Lord Elrond has the gift of foresight. So maybe he's seen Estel changing his name often although I don't know how he'd do that, I don't think there's a registry of names in Imladris. It's a small knit community everyone just knows each other.

Second is the hot springs. A few hours into our trek and I was sweating like a pig, ready for another bath. I wish indoor plumbing was portable.

And third is the fact that I had my own room. The dwarves camped out but I stayed in a room which meant that when I went to sleep I could take off my bra. There is no freedom in the world that compares to wearing no bra. Seriously, none.

I didn't cycle since then because we were all trekking. We had to keep a very specific pace because we were waiting for Gandalf to catch up but at the same time we couldn't stay back too long because whatever they'd found on the map had given them a deadline.

We'd been hiking for the whole day and the sun had just set when my phone suddenly burst into multiple chimes and finally I had network again. I had a million messages to go through, most of them from Alex and all sounding a bit hysterical and a few from my work group who had finally gotten around to taking pictures of George's new butt and sent them to me. I laughed so much that I fell off the log I was sitting on and Kili and Fili had to help me up and Oin began hovering again, making sure I was okay.

I think I'll miss Oin the most when I get home. He doesn't say much if it isn't related to injuries but he gets concerned over me. I'm not really used to that. It's a bit amazing and warmth inducing. One of these I might even hug him which coming from me, is a big thing.

"What's got you so happy?" Bilbo asked once I was back on my butt and not on my back anymore.

"I just got a picture of George, he's a guy I used to work with and he got butt implants. They look ridiculous!"

"Butt implants?"

I explained the concept of butt implants and plastic surgery in general.

I swear to all the Gods and Goddesses above that they have never looked as terrified, shocked and repulsed as they did then. Seriously. Thorin's usual 'Talking about Elves' face isn't as bad as the one he made when I was done with my explanation. It was epic.

But Alex had apparently finally gotten my message saying I was fine and called me up and so before I could diffuse their horror (which I really couldn't) I was busy telling Alex about every single thing about Imladris when he suddenly got huffy and just cut the call.

"That was weird." I said out loud when Alex made some sad excuses clearly lying (he can't lie to me to save his life) and just cut the call, right in the middle of my sentence.

"What was?"

"Well I was telling him about Rivendell and he cut the call on me. Sounded huffy too."

"What were you telling him?"

"Just telling him about Estel, that's all."

"Ah, that explains it."

"Explains what?"

"He's jealous." He said as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.

"What? That's ridiculous!"

Why would Alex be jealous of Estel? Although it is a bit weird that he didn't even crack one joke about how Estel is a girl's name.

"Come on, it's been just the tow of you for pretty much his whole life, now suddenly you're not there, it's his fault and then you started talking about some boy you met who's very well behaved. I bet you mentioned that he reminded you of Alex?"

"Well yes but-"

"There you go, Alex probably feels like you've replaced him."

It was while I contemplated that thought that Thorin began looming over me. "Get up." He commanded rather gruffly.

I do not like being commanded.

"Why?" I said while burrowing myself even deeper into my seat and actually relaxing into the lotus position breathing deeply to piss him off.

"The paths won't remain safe for much longer. You need to learn to fight. Besides," He smirked. It made me want to do things to him, "If you intend to give me that blow to the head you were talking about, you will have to learn how to make your hits count."

"Lovely thought but I don't have a weapon and all your swords are far too heavy for me to lift let alone fight with."

I had tried lifting Thorin's sword one day when he'd asked me to hand it to him while he went on night guard duty. Now I'm not lacking in upper body strength but I still nearly fell over. I had to carry it close to my chest to manage to stay upright and my boobs had bruises on them the next day.

But instead of giving in when I said that, he got his cane like thing that they were all carrying and twirled it around. "We'll start with this."

"Cool."

"Do you have any experience with a staff?"

It was hard not to make innuendo about what I knew to do with a staff but I managed somehow.

"Not really. I did some Krav Maga for a year or so but nothing armed."

"Let's test this Kragamar."

"Krav Maga. It's defensive so you have to try to-" Before I could say attack me he leapt forward, the cane he was holding aimed at my head. Not exactly unexpected though, since the second he said 'learnt o fight' I'd been waiting for him to do something like that so I deflected with the back of my arm, reached forward grabbed his arm, slammed my knee up into his torso and took the stick out of his hand and then touched his jaw with it lightly. It was textbook, seriously and over within seconds.

But he looked just the slight bit winded. He wasn't as hurt as me though because I had slammed my leg up right into his armour and my knee hurt quite a bit. But still, it was Thorin so I give myself some semblance of kudos anyway. The dude is ripped and carries a sword that weighs as much as Bilbo. Well he sued to, his new sword seems to be quite light.

"You held back." He growled instead of the compliment I was expecting. But Bilbo, Ori, Kili and Fili's gaping mouths were enough.

"So did you, if you're not going at me with your full force, don't expect me to do so."

"You did well, this Kramagar will stand you in good stead against goblins at least."

"Krav Maga. Unless they wear armour, if that's the case I'll be out of the game after a few minutes of fighting, whatever you're wearing, hurts like hell." I rubbed my knee and he smirked.

"Where did you learn this Krav Maga?" This time he said it right and I grinned.

"At the local community center, I started learning it because I thought it would help me become more Zen and centred because yoga and tai chi weren't working too well. Before I did that I used to smoke but it aggravated Alex's asthma so I stopped which left me with no way of dealing with the stress."

"Zen?"

"Calm. I don't know if you've noticed but I tend to yell at people."

"Oh I've noticed." You know you yell too much when Thorin Oakenshield implies that it's a bit much. "You'll still need a weapon though."

"I know. Tell me what kind and I'll have Alex send one over for me."

"That won't be necessary."

"But you _just_ said I'll need a weapon."

"There is a village that we shall pass tomorrow. I can make you something in the forges there."

And that's when things got awkward.

"That really won't be necessary."

He glowered. He does that a lot. "Do you not believe me capable of making you a weapon?"

I snorted. "Why the hell would I think that?"

"Then why won't you let me make you a weapon?"

"Because Alex-?"

"Why does everything you say go back to him?" He asked heatedly before I could complete my sentence.

"Why do you get angry at everything? So I won't let you make me a weapon, chill out, I'd be more comfortable with something Alex makes. Besides, his workshop is at home, if I tell him now he'll have something made for me by the end of the day even." He settled back but still looked sulky. "Why do you have to take everything to be an offense?"

I stalked off still rolling my eyes. One minute he's calm next his head's blowing up. I don't understand men. Or dwarves. Or dwarf men.

"Don't mind him lass." Balin said kindly but before he could launch into yet another tale of why Thorin Oakenshield is the way he is, I interrupted him.

"I don't mind him, he has the right to his anger just as I have the right to not stay around him if he's being prissy. I saw a situation that I didn't like and took myself out of it that's all."

Men. All dumbasses.

Balin looked down at me with his rather shrewd eyes. Reminds me of my Nonna.

"Is that what you always do? Take yourself out of a situation?" It's strange how he makes it sound like a bad thing.

"It's logical. Besides at the end of the big fight we'd have the results would be the same someone would storm off then we all go to sleep and next day everything is fine."

"But perhaps you'd sleep easier if you told him what was happening instead of running away."

"I don't sleep easy any way, my sleeping bag doesn't have enough layers to keep the stones from poking me in my back."

Not to sound like the chick from the Princess and the Pea but seriously, rocks in my back. No one sleeps well.

Wonder if Bombur feels all the stones through the layer of fat on him.

"Oh for Mahal's sake just talk to him."

"Jeez, alright already."

Balin's weird.

Still I went up to Thorin anyway.

"Oi I don't like taking things from you guys in general and I don't have the moolah to pay for weapons. Seriously, it's bad enough you guys are helping me out so much, I can't handle any more of this niceness."

Thorin blinked. "You are put off by our...kindness?"

"It's not an even trade."

"I do not think the point of kindness is an even trade." He pointed out carefully. "Besides which you had no problems accepting the hospitality you had at the Burglar's home or Rivendell."

"Yeah but that was their home. This is not home, this is a journey with things being a bit hard to come by as it is even when you aren't sharing them with others."

"What would you have us do then?"

"I appreciate what you've allowed really, I do, but I feel guilty enough as it is without the rest. And I think I might have offended your pride by implying Alex could do a better job, didn't I?"

He nodded hesitantly as if he couldn't quite figure out where I was going with it.

"Yes."

"I'm sorry about it then. I don't think there are blacksmiths in my world. Not many at least. I've never met one."

Thorin's eyes became so wide I couldn't help but laugh.

"No blacksmiths?"

"No there are manufacturing companies. Machines doing the work instead. I don't think they would have been able to keep up with the demand if normal people were making things."

"Perhaps not men but Dwarves would manage."

"There are no Dwarves in our world. And there are many people. Too many actually, there's a problem of population pressure."

"You do not speak of your world."

I shrugged. "I don't think I should."

"Why not?"

"You know how plants are often taken and planted in other areas where they might not usually exist?"

"Yes."

"Well sometimes those species are invasive. They grow better in that area than the others and take over everything. And that ends up destroying the entire ecosystem of living beings that depend upon the original species."

"So?"

"So a thought can be like that. I could just offhandedly mention something that might cause a thought process that otherwise might not have happened. And that can be good or bad but I don't really have the right to cause that change. I'm not from here, the consequences would not be for me to bear."

I've spent too much time here, I'm even starting to talk like them. 'Not for me to bear', eurgh, how melodramatic.

"I don't think a thought could change the world." He scoffed and I couldn't help but laugh.

Penicillin was discovered by accident and somehow changed our world. Hell I'm just twenty something and sometimes I think of my childhood and the world I live in now and get amazed by the differences. Maybe because their world moves a bit slower they don't quite see how the tiniest of things could change everything but it can. If I told them about my world, I could revolutionise warfare. I could change the the way medication works, I could change everything.

Holy crap I could change everything! I have power like no one has ever had before, I could revolutionise this whole world and then hold it ransom. I can have everything I've ever wanted money _and_ power!

I could rule this whole motherfudging world!

* * *

By the time we reached the little village I had finally managed to get my power hungriness under control. Sure I could improve the world and remake it in my image (yes I know how arrogant that sounds) but with great power comes great responsibility and tonnes of paperwork. I don't want paperwork.

It was a seriously small village and people were kind of piling into caravans even as we got there and moving.

"For winter." Kili explained. "The humans aren't as hardy as we are."

"T'is not winter why they leave." Balin said carefully watching the proceedings. He'd gone off to talk to some of the people who'd stared at me with wide eyes. If I was a more funny and flamboyant person I would have pointed at myself and said 'Look and Marvel!'. But I'm not. I'm boring and dull and have no sense of humour and I'm dead on the inside. "Goblins have been coming down from the mountains and stealing, pillaging. Bad times have come upon the world."

But because of that we were the only clients of the inn in the village which was actually run by a dwarf.

"Bless my beard, t'is Thorin Oakenshield, thrice in one year." The dwarf who was shorter than the ones I was travelling with just a bit over Bilbo's head actually said. He had olive coloured skin, one eyes green while the other was blue and a flat nose that seemed to have been broken quite a few times. Half of his grey hair was in tight braids pulled all across the top of his head while the other half was loose and his beard was so epically gravity defying I can't even describe it. I could actually see Balin kind of pout at the sight of it.

"Evening Áki."

Áki's eyebrows shot way up when he saw me at the end of the group.

"And who might this be?" He asked surprised which had me confused. Kili, however, explained that humans travelling with dwarves was practically unheard of.

"Someone lost." Thorin said and Áki clearly wanted to ask questions but didn't. "We'll need rooms for the night."

We came down for food and I was quite honestly not in the best mood. I'd just gone on facebook and found out that Aaron was dating again and they were facebook official and worst of all I knew who she was. Well, kind of, I _told_ Aaron that the barista from that coffee shop across from his workplace was hitting on him but he said there was no way she was. Well I was right wasn't I? Now they're 'in a relationship' and it's not even 'complicated'.

I'm not even annoyed that he's moved on, it's just frustrating that he's dating other people while I'm in another world and I've had to quit my job to facilitate that. I should be winning this break up damn it, I'm obviously the better one!

Plus I told him so and I really want to just gloat in his face that I was right and she really was flirting with him.

"Hey Bilbo."

"What's got you down?"

"Just got a notification that's really annoying me."

"Here, have an ale." He said and pushed a pitcher to me. "There's not much in life a warm bed and a pitcher of ale can't solve."

Normally I would have said hell no and not even taken a sip. But I was superbly annoyed and missing home so like an idiot, I chugged it.

Worst. Decision. Ever.

The next morning was weird. Really weird. I woke up feeling like crap and stumbled my way down the stairs and sat down at the long table and dug in to the plat of eggs like a madwoman. Thorin refused to look at me but I'd catch him looking at me when he didn't think I was looking, Dwalin and Balin kept on whispering in the corner and gesturing at me, Kili and Fili were outright laughing and Bofur winked at me like he knew some secret and the others were also a bit aloof. Well not exactly aloof but there were a lot of cleared throats and pointed looks. The only person close to normal was Bilbo who seemed amused but otherwise fine so I asked him exactly what happened.

"You don't remember?"

"I remember thinking that the ale tasted strangely sweet and after that nothing. Did I get drunk and do something stupid? Only I've never actually been drunk before."

I had a mild headache but other than that I was fine, I just figured the headache was from sleeping with my hair tied up, that always gives me a slight migraine.

"Yes you mentioned that yesterday."

I blinked. I did not remember doing that.

"I don't remember anything I did."

"You were a sad drunk."

"Really?"

"Yes and you started crying."

"What?! I haven't cried in years."

Seriously, years. Ten years in fact which is a little under half my life.

"Well yesterday you did."

"What else did I do?"

"Halfling-" Thorin said threateningly but the minute I turned to look at him he did something that can only be described as blushing and sat down again.

"I clearly did something stupid, what did I do?"

"You talked about a man named Aaron."

"Not him again! I thought I was doing well."

"You said that. And you said that he was your first serious boyfriend but you just didn't want to _do_ him. Oh and then you kissed Thorin before passing out and- Are you okay?" Bilbo looked at me concernedly. In his defence I probably looked like I'd died. It was because I was remembering doing all that.

Bilbo had been nice about it. He hadn't mentioned the crying was actually pathetic weeping and that I had weaved from place to place and that I'd also asked Balin why my Mommy and Daddy didn't love me. Or the off tune singing of 'I love Rock n Roll' which they didn't even understand because it was in English and not Westron. And he didn't know this but I had also woken up shortly after passing out only to leave a drunk message to Aaron.

"I am never drinking again. Do not ever let me touch alcohol, ever!" I ordered Bilbo who laughed again before finally turning back to Thorin. "I am so sorry Thorin."

"It's all right." He said quietly. Which is never good because Thorin is just never quiet.

"It's not alright, I molested you for God's sake!"

I remembered kissing him now. My hands had wandered. A _lot_.

He let out a deep sigh. "Let's just forget this ever happened. After all you've never had a drink before."

"How do you know that?"

I actually had never had a drink before. Between homeschooling Alex and then internships and jobs I'd never had the time to drink whether legally or illegally. Plus I didn't exactly have friends so there's no one to drag me out to go to the local bar or anything. The closest to a friend is actually Mrs Costanza and Aaron which is all kinds of sad.

Although the cashier at a boutique did once invite me out to a club. But I don't think it was a friendly outing given that her eyes were staring a few inches south of my face.

I should go die in a pit. I'd sexually assaulted the King under the Mountain!


	11. Chapter 11

Climbing up into the misty mountains was tough. Seriously tough, not to mention tiring. I mean holy mother of God, my gym trainer had said I was fit but I have realised very early on that I am not. The higher we climbed the more easily I got out of breath, between the rain and the cold and the thinner air it was just really utterly exhausting.

But I wasn't the only one who was affected by it everyone's been havinga terrible time. Even Thorin just kept on getting grumpier and grumpier. I'm almost certain he's botox-ed his face into that grr face because he even sleeps with that expression. I can't imagine sleeping like that, I'd wake up with my facial muscles all sore.

And on the days when it wasn't that exhausting and I didn't just fall asleep with soup bowl still in hand, Thorin would teach me how to fight with my sword while I managed to somehow avoid ever looking him in the eye because of embarrassment and I would be all sorts of exhausted by the end of the day anyway.

Talking about my sword, Alex made me one. It is pretty and sharp. He said a lot about the research he did into it to find the best sword suited for me and blah blah blah. Mainly it is sort of short, not gigantic like Gandalf's or sexily curved like Thorin's or even adorable like Bilbo's baby sword (letter opener it is not, I knicked myself on it just last night). Mine is just slightly curved and pretty light and a bit flattish. Thorin said it was beautifully balanced and went into rapture because he thought the hilt was made of mithril but Alex said it was titanium.

I don't really care much because frankly, I'm afraid I'm actually going to have to use it. Freaks me out a bit.

But basically this hiking business is exhausting. Can't believe people do this for fun, holy crap it hurts. My thighs feel like they are made out of jelly and have been put into a blitzer. So basically I have gone from being an insomniac to sleeping like the dead. _Actually_ like the dead, woke up once to Balin shaking me so hard my teeth almost fell out, apparently my breathing was very very slow.

It's hard and it's not just hard for me. Bilbo is also close to killing someone. Or throwing himself off the mountain I don't know which. After tonight's fiasco with the stone giants and Thorin being very rude to him, he's been a bit more moody than usual. I figured that it was nothing a good night's sleep wouldn't cure though and began getting ready to sleep.

"We should talk more often." Kili said, settling down on one side of me while Fili settles down on the other.

"Get to know each other." Fili continued.

My eyes went from one to the other blankly.

"I talk more to you two than anyone in the whole group."

"Except for Mister Baggins." Fili pointed out.

"Because he's in the same boat as me, lost and unaware."

"So you're not..." Kili trailed off looking at Fili with a look that said ' _You_ say it'.

"What are your intentions with Bilbo?" The blond elaborated and a big neon sign with the word 'Dafuq?!' written on it flashed in my head.

"Pardon?"

"You aren't...interested in Mister Baggins? Because we would, ahem, advise against such a course of action."

"You don't need to do that. I have no intentions with Bilbo, he's a good friend to have that's all."

Fili sat back in relief which is weird to say the least.

"Oh good, good."

"What brought this sudden bout of concern on?" I was suspicious to say the least. Of course 'suspicious' is my natural state so that isn't really saying much.

"Oh nothing just...general concern."

"Riiight. You two aren't-?" I let the sentence remain unfinished just to see what they would fill the blanks with.

"No no no we're not interested in you." Kili denied a bit too vehemently for my pride. My sanity, on the other hand, revelled in it.

"Good because that would be pretty pointless wouldn't it. Forming an attachment just for me to leave and go back to my world soon." I said amusedly.

"We didn't think of that." The two shared a look and stared off with a frown. How could they not have thought of it, there's no other good reason to warn me off Bilbo. I'm not interested in him at all but he's not bad in any sense of the term and we get along well.

"You're set on going back home then?" Kili asked after a few moments of introspective silence.

"Uhh yeah." Obviously.

"Do you miss it?" Fili asked.

"Oh yes. I miss it really badly actually."

"What do you miss the most?"

"Well Alex obviously. Then there's my blankie, I really miss my blankie. Up until now I've never slept without it, I had it made into a pillow actually, I even carry it with me on business trips. Oh and I miss getting dressed up in the morning and having long showers and having a reason to put on makeup and wearing skirts that go above the knee and feeling the sun on my legs. Never liked it when I had to do it but now I miss the ritual of it all you know?"

"...No we don't." Yeah, I guess they wouldn't. Kili and Fili in short skirts and makeup.

They'd probably be prettier than me. I miss being a girl. Not that the Company treats me like a dude or anything but despite them treating me like I'm made of glass, I just don't feel like a girl. Or a human being even. Instead of working on interworld portals and cloning and AI's and what not, Alex shouls be workign on portable showers. That might even help us achieve world peace.

"It's vain and silly but that's what I miss I guess, being silly." Can't stop thinking of that pretty ivory coloured blouse that I bought one week before landing in Middle Earth. I miss my wardrobe.

"That's nice." Kili said and then with no hint of a segue, changed the topic. "What do you think of our uncle?"

"Thorin? He...does not have the best sense of direction." We got lost twice on the mountain paths and had to double back. Pretty sure when he cut off Azog's arm he was aiming for something else.

Form what we saw of the Orcs when we were running, it didn't seem like they wear much. Maybe he was aiming for Azog's dangly bits. Do Orcs even have dangly bits? Or are they like ken dolls down there?

"No he doesn't," Kili laughed breathlessly, "Last time we were halfway to-but that's not the point. What do you think of him as a person?"

I shrugged. I don't exactly think of Thorin _that_ often. Only sometimes.

Although I do have some weird dreams of him as a fluffy white rabbit.

"I don't know. He's cool."

" _Cool_ , is that good?" Fili asked tentatively.

"Well yeah. You're all cool." I gave them both two thumbs up but instead of the normal grins I was expecting I got this weird look from them, almost tired looking. But I guess the journey had been pretty tiring, I was halfway to sleep already so I let it go when they crept away saying things in that secret language of theirs.

"You're a bit dense aren't you?" Balin said. Apparently everyone was listening to us which isn't a surprise since it's a cave and caves tend to be echo-ey. But they were all shaking their head looking all disappointed and Thorin looked even more 'grr' than usual.

"I'm sleepy." I offer by way of explanation and fluff up my bag that I was using as a pillow since he just laughed. After that it was barely a few seconds before I was off to sleep.

I had a weird dream. Not that I don't often have weird dreams, but this dream was weird because it wasn't really a dream at all. I was actually remembering myself talking to Thorin from back at the inn all those days back when I was drunk.

" _You know-hic-you're the same as me." I told Thorin who looked amused._

" _Is that so?"_

" _Umm hmm, you don't know who you are." I said pointing at him. Well one of the hims, at that point I was seeing triple._

" _Do tell."_

" _You know how to be Thorin Oakenshield and you know how to be Thorin, son of Thrain, son of Thror, but you don't know how to be Thorin. Just plain Thorin. I get that. Half the time I forget my own name. I'm Alex's sister. Or the upstairs who lives girl with the noisy brother who up stays all night." I giggled. "I'm so drunk."_

" _Perhaps it is not in our fate to be our own people." Thorin said his voice a bit choked._

" _Probably. Sometimes I think of who I would have been if it hadn't been for Alex. I don't know if I would like myself. Would I like plain old Alethia?"_

" _Your name is Alessia."_

" _You sure about that? Could have sworn it was Alethia. Or was it Alice? I've already fallen down the rabbit hole. Even met a mad hatter, although Bofur isn't really too mad. Oooh Gandlaf is the smoking caterpillar! We even have our own little Queen of Hearts in Azog,_ _'Off with his head!' she said'" I giggled but Thorin flinched. I didn't quite notice, far too gone. "And ALex is the Cheshire cat and Kili and Fili can be Tweedledum and Tweedledee. And you are the White Rabbit of course, 'Oh dear, oh dear, I shall be too late!' Only instead of a pocket watch you look to the sky and think of your deadline date, all dramatic like."_

" _Indeed?"_

" _I don't like deadlines."_

" _I should imagine no one does."_

" _I don't have a deadline. I mean my deadline is just as soon as possible. I want to go home which is kind of what you want isn't it?"_

" _You become much more talkative when you're drunk."_

" _I know! It's like I'm Melissa from accounting! I just talk and talk and talk and not even about anything in particular. I think. Wait, what was I talking about?"_

" _Deadlines."_

" _Right. I don't have one. So I'm telling you right now that I'll probably go by some safer road if we happen to find one. After Gandalf uses up his favour, I don't like owing people. That always comes back to bite you in the butt. You have a nice butt."_

" _Wake up!"_

And then I woke up realising that it wasn't part of the dream but reality. Thorin was calling for us all to wake up and I did so while coming to terms with exactly why Thorin appears in my dreams as a fluffy white rabbit.

My arms were still wrapped around my bag which was a good thing because suddenly the ground underneath us gave out and we were sliding down some tunnels which was rather unexpected.

We slid around for a surprisingly long time until finally landing in a little holding area cordoned off by bones. I was luckily in between Balin and Nori off to the side. Just as the final one of us had landed on the heap, a horde of goblins started coming towards us and began passing us forward like in an assembly line. I was shoved along with the rest but at one moment Dwalin who was particularly unhappy about being manhandled (goblinhandled?) created a bit of a ruckus and there was a tug on my coat that pulled me harshly down to my knees.

Goblins are not too bright and certainly not very good at escorting people because they hadn't noticed that Bilbo and I had both managed to stay back simply by kneeling and avoiding all attention by being utterly quiet and yet moving just a smidge when nudged. Consequently we now stood just the two of us in the now empty walkway.

"Thanks for that." I told Bilbo rather sincerely.

Fact is, I'd always figured that I'd be the one rescuing Bilbo instead of the other way round. Although considering that he was the one who saved the dwarves from being turned into shish kebab via trolls, I shouldn't be too surprised with this.

"Thank me when we find a way out of here." His eyes scoured the area and he took his baby sword out.

"Will do."

"I'll look ahead to see if there's any way out." He said softly.

"I'm going to see if there are any stairs leading up, maybe we can get out the way we came in."

"Good thinking." He said and we parted ways. Perhaps not the smartest thing to have done, splitting up like that but I thought that since he had his baby sword and I had mine as well, we'd be fine.

I realised that I was wrong when I turned around at the sound of a fight only to see Bilbo careening off the edge of the platform a goblin attached to his back, his sword following him making tinny little clangs all the way down.

And then, I was all alone.


	12. Chapter 12

I paced alone on the platform. Bilbo had fallen so far down that I couldn't even see the glow of his sword and the dwarves were taken as well. There was only one path going anywhere from the little trap where we'd fallen in and that was the same way that the dwarves had been taken.

There was a choice ahead of me. I couldn't get out of this place alone, that much was clear, I would need the dwarves help, and by help I mean prowess with weapons, to get out of here. But there might be another way out at the bottom of the mountain where Bilbo had fallen. So I could either find a way to rescue the dwarves, get out of the mountain, regain my bearings and go back to find Bilbo or I could jump off the platform to the bottom where Bilbo probably was and possibly die from the fall.

Then again there were goblins holding the dwarves prisoner and if I went to get them, that might lead to death as well.

So you see it was quite a quandary. There was only way around it.

"Eeny, meeny, miny, moe, catch a tiger by the toe, if he hollers, let him go, eeny, meeny, miny, moe."

And dwarves it was. Now all I needed was a plan.

"Alex, I'm in an underground city of goblins and they've taken everyone prisoner and there's no way out. Any ideas?"

" _WHAT?!"_

"That's not an idea. Alright tell me what you know about goblins."

" _Nothing much, they're magical too. Nothing like Gandalf of course, except for a few places that all correspond with Elven settlements and a couple of other places with some super powerful spells on them, nothing is as magical as Gandalf."_

"Well Gandalf's not here, we were supposed to meet him in the mountains but then this happened."

" _He's not there?"_

"No."

" _Damn. Magic would be pretty useful now."_

Which is when some semblance of a plan starts forming in my head.

See, in this world magic is actually Magic with a capital M. But in ours it's misdirection, sleight of hands and illusions. Very smart illusions. I have a very smart brother, it stood to reason that I could achieve a smart enough illusion to screw with the goblins' minds long enough to get out of there.

"What if I make them think I have magic?"

" _It has to be the right kind of magic though. Or they won't be scared of you."_

"But what would goblins be scared of anyway? And should I even scare them, maybe I should make them think that I'm a friend of theirs?"

Whatever I was going to do I would have to be quick about it. I needed to find a way out of there and then I needed to find a way back in so I could look for Bilbo.

" _Both. Intimidate them but get their approval."_

"But how, I mean what I'd normally do wouldn't work here."

Ideally I would like to scare the goblins but I'm not scary and frankly if they can stand to look at each other without screaming in fear and disgust, nothing I could come up with would be any better. So what I really needed was to create an Atmosphere. Back home I would do it by fixing the lights so they'd flicker, random noises and voices appearing out of nowhere, slamming doors and what not. Here, I'd need a bloody wind machine to take out the lights, random noises couldn't be arranged for and there were no doors to slam.

But I am nothing if not resourceful and I have a pocket dimension in my pocket.

"Alex give me last year's Halloween costume, the mask and the wig both, and pretty much your entire magic kit."

* * *

Goblins are stupid. This was once again made obvious when I walked up to them and no one noticed. How did they possibly not notice? I was wearing the Guy Fawke's mask from that V for Vendetta movie and had a walking cane/magic wand that I was carrying with me and tapping all the while that I walked up to them! And while this lack of attention was great for sneaking away from the goblins, right now I needed to be noticed.

So I cleared my throat loudly.

That got their attention. They scrambled around me, pointing spears right in my face and generally creating a big enough ruckus that the King who was doing a song and dance routine (somehow even that giant potato thing was more graceful than me) stopped.

"What's that?! Another intruder?!"

"This one's different your malevolence!" The one goblin who was not pointing a spear at me said.

"Hello Goblin King." I said. Only it was my voice that came out of it. The voice distorter in the mask was making me sound growly and menacing and between the voice and the mask a few goblins were actually stepping away although it might also have been the smoke that was coming out of me via some magical stuff Alex gave. "So this is the infamous Goblin Town." I laughed. It was an evil laugh.

"Bring forth the new one!" He said and they began pushing me forward but then ended up having to catch up to me. I'm a speed walker and soon I was looking right at the giant potato. Potato is the right word, seriously, even his eyes were like potato eyes. And the weird wattles like thing under his chin was just weird. I am so glad to have a mask on because then he can't see me looking pointedly away from his neck because I don't want to throw up. "And just who might you be? These little maggots keep on telling tales." He pointed his mace like thing at the dwarves.

"They would. _Dwarves_." I snorted. I'd heard all that was going on, apparently they were very much trying to keep Thorin to the back. Still don't understand why but whatever, I can make it work. "Them and stupid songs about men in moon and blunting knives, ha! Blasted, mangy creatures!"

And the look of understanding dawned on them and they realised that it was me under the mask. That had been something I'd been worrying about, how to make them realise I wasn't...some crazy person in a mask who was consorting with the goblins. Figured mentioning the blunting knives song was a sure fire thing, Bilbo had complained about it to me often enough that they had sung it again.

"Who are you?" The Goblin King repeated although he seemed a bit appeased now that I'd called them maggots.

"Apologies, your malevolence." I said and bowed. "I am...Count Dracula!"

Rule no 1 of shady dealings, give a false name. Create a false identity to go with the false name if you have to but never give your false name. Course, _my_ shady dealings usually concern some grey area of publicity and on occasion black markets deals.

And I may have called a hypothetical hit for someone who was gunning for Alex but that was entirely hypothetical. Kind of. Let's not go there.

But Count Dracula is not a person here and I can remember that name.

"And why are you here?"

"I am here because I've been following these foul creatures on their path. The Pale Orc thinks they shall lead us to the one whose head he wants."

"The Pale Orc is here?" He was all but jumping with excitement, stomping his feet rather happily which sucked for those small goblins who were acting as his footrest.

And if that isn't enough of an indicator that the Orc that Thorin believes 'died of his wounds long ago' is alive, I don't know what is. I mean the Goblin King wasn't surprised at all that the pale Orc was mentioned.

"He will be once I tell him where to go. There were sixteen who left and yet only thirteen here. The idiots keep on losing their...friends." I laughed again. It was super unpleasant once distorted, which pleased the Goblin King.

"Who you calling an idiot?!" One of them said which was good because if they kept too quiet it would be suspicious.

"All of you, you imbeciles!" I barked, turning to the Goblin King and we shared a snort.

I figured after that it would be easy peasy, tell the Goblin King that Azog demanded them to be handed over and that I had to be the one to escort them, sure there would be a bit of dithering and I would have to use my manipulative powers of PR and some of the fire tricks that Alex had given me to let it happen but it would have been easy.

Only that blasted wizard showed up and did some magic thing, blowing out the fires in the place and throwing a hell a lot of goblins off in one guts of magical wind (which left us somehow completely unharmed) and began yelling.

"Take up arms! Fight! FIGHT!"

Dumbass shows up late to the party and ruins my plan, his magical wind broke my voice distorter so that when I tried to talk to the Goblin King my normal voice came out instead and he pointed while simultaneously going up his seat at the sight of Thorin's sexy sword which had been unsheathed in the fight.

"YOU! TRAITOR! LIAR!"

"Well of course I'm a liar you dumbass." I said and knocked off the goblin who was trying to strangle me with the cane.

Then began a long run, filled with a vast amount of fighting. Swords were swung, punches were thrown, random objects were picked up and used as weapons and at one point we even created a swing and used it to swing ourselves off onto the next platform. At one point Gandalf did his magical stick thingy and broke a boulder over our head. It rolled in front and cleared the path for us.

I had racked up quite a score of dead goblins. By the time we got to the final bridge, I was twenty four! I didn't do all the fancy twirling with swords like Thorin did or even that awesome thing with a stick that Blain did where he just swung it round and round and threw goblins up but still, I jabbed and slashed and hacked and kicked my fair share.

And then the Goblin King burst out from right under the bridge and blocked us again. Now we had the goblins on one side and the Goblin King on the other.

"You thought you could escape me?!" He laughed hideously and then pointed his mace at me. "And you, traitor! Is your name even Count Dracula?!" He sounded properly betrayed which made me happy and disappointed at the same time.

Obviously I had managed to do a great job of convincing him I was on his side. Clearly if Gandalf hadn't shown up, my plan would have worked. On the other hand I intensely dislike the fact that I managed to convince the goblin king I was on his side with such little effort.

Surely I'm not _that_ naturally repugnant?

"Not really." I answered his rhetorical question and he got super pissed off and started lashing out with his mace.

"You'll pay for that!" He swiped down on my side, barely missing me by a hairsbreadth before attacking Gandalf. "What are you going to do now, wizard?!"

And Gandalf neatly sliced open the goblin's stomach.

"That'll do it." At least the goblin king had the grace to accept his defeat before collapsing onto the bridge and the weakened pillars of rotting wood creaked and groaned before breaking and we were falling down, down, down. Pretty sure I broke something in the fall

Somehow we were still alive despite, it all and Thorin crawled out from the wreckage before helping me as well.

"Well that could have been worse." Bofur said and with accordance to Murphy's law, the Goblin's King's giant corpse fell down as well.

Seriously, there is no chance whatsoever of anyone making it through this quest alive if Bofur keeps on being so optimistic about it, you can't just go about inviting trouble by saying things could be worse, you have to be a pessimist and _expect_ the absolute worst!

"You've got to be joking!" Dwalin growled and just then Kili spotted hordes of goblins coming down the walls right at us.

Seriously, Murphy's law.

'That could have been worse? Well here, have worse, this Goblin King's body needs to be thrown about a bit anyway.'

'You've got to be joking? Why of course not silly dwarf, here are some hordes of angry goblins coming right at you to tell you exactly how little of a joke this is!'

"Only one thing will save us, daylight, COME ON!"

I'm getting tired of all the yelling. Couldn't he just break open a bit of the roof of the mountain so that daylight comes in? No apparently he can't, instead he wants us all to run. Run, run, run. Again.

When this quest is done, I am never exercising again and will instead spend all my time in front of a TV with lots of junk food.

We ran out and eventually stopped to catch our breath when we were far enough down the mountain side.

As I expected, the fall had jolted me in some way and my shoulder had just popped out of the joint. Oin came up to me after checking on the others.

"You alright lass?"

"My shoulder's popped out." I yelled because his ear trumpet was gone.

"Let me see." He stepped forward running his hand over my arm as if testing things before suddenly and with no warning just putting his hand over my shoulder and popping it back in. I shrieked of course, because it hurt like a bitch.

"What the hell?!"

"It hurts less if you don't see it coming."

"Son of a bitch!"

"Where's Bilbo?" Gandalf worried.

Thorin growled. "If he had any sense he is on his way back home, the hobbit has -

"Yeah right. You're wrong on so many levels, first off he fell off the walkway fighting off a goblin, I tried to see but it was too dark and so I came to check on you instead. And then there's the fact that even if he made it somehow, he wouldn't go home of only because he doesn't exactly know this place well enough to turn back and find his way. I'm going back in, you guys go ahead."

"Why?"

"Because Bilbo's probably in there somewhere lost and hurt. I couldn't stop him from falling off the least I can do is find him and lead him out here."

"That won't be necessary." Said Bilbo of all people and there he was, stepping out from behind a tree like nothing had gone wrong and I slapped my hand on his face before pulling his skin about making sure it really was him and that he really was alive. Which he was, although he'd busted his knuckles up something fierce.

"Holy shit!" I said still tugging on his face when Thorin began growling and asked him why he'd soem back.

There was all this talk about home and stuff after that, I couldn't quite care and was a bit distracted by the feel of something sticky on my face. I'd taken the mask off sometime during the run and had a bit of a cut running down my forehead. Oin who had lost his hearing trumpet couldn't really hear Bilbo's awesome speech so he helped fix me up instead.

And then just as a bandage was nicely fixed onto my head, a howl was heard and it was back to running. Eventually we just ran out of space to run in and went up the trees instead, Thorin pulling me up when the one shoulder that still hurt like a bitch became a bit of a problem.

The Wargs were still growling and pacing around the trees where we were when they stopped. If Wargs could ever smirk that was the moment when they did so and they fell back to let what I assumed to be Azog on his white Warg through.

The guy wasn't just pale, he was an albino. And the worst part of it all was he still looked pretty...normal. He actually looked like a really bald elf with only one hand instead of an Orc. The Orcs we'd encountered frankly looked like they were still decomposing but this guy...he was fine.

In another life and possibly back in my own world, I would have flirted with him kind of fine. Even the facial scars are kind of hot.

Then he began talking to his Warg but in the silence we could hear him just like we could hear the individual breaths of all the Wargs and their riders along with our own.

And Black Speech? It hurts. Honestly it's like every word he spoke was curling up around my sadly flat chest and pressing down hard trying to break through my ribs and made me feel like I was nursing the mother of all migraines. He must have issued some kind of order then because the Wargs surged forward and began leaping tearing off branches and sending us higher up the trees. One of them almost got my boot but I have had such experiences before. Once when I was on the monkey bars a rabid dog had found itself onto the playground. All the other kids ran away but I was stuck on the monkey bars and the dog kept on biting and tugging on my skirt. I had kicked it off then and I did so again with the Warg and then climbed higher. But their force was tearing away at the trees and they began toppling. We all began jumping from one tree to the other until finally we were all on the one lone tree at the precipice.

Something whizzed past my ears and I looked up to see that Gandalf had the brilliant idea of setting pinecones on fire and lobbing them at the Wargs.

While we ourselves were up in a tree. A highly flammable tree.

Oi vey.

And then everyone else joined in! They cheered as the Wargs ran away but I turned to Thorin worried.

"It's not a good idea to set the forest on fire when we're up in a TRE-!" The last of my word was turned into a scream as the tree we were in began to tilt hard and suddenly I wasn't facing the Orcs anymore but was instead upside down over the rest of the world. There is no fear like when you're hanging upside down off a tree that's in the process of falling off a cliff.

I don't know what happened exactly while I was righting myself and turning so that I was sitting on the tree as opposed to hanging off it but in that time, Thorin had apparently decided to fight Azog, failed and gotten KO-ed.

"We have to help him!" Bilbo said and I agreed. As the two people who were nearest to the cliff and were also facing the right way up, it was up to us to do something obviously. So we ran and Bilbo and I ended up standing in between Thorin and Azog and the other Orcs. Even as I did that I felt stupid. And so I put my sword away which was hard enough to handle because of the throbbing in my arm and brought out my secret weapon.

Well I say secret weapon but I really mean secret might-be-used-as-a-weapon.

The white Warg began to run towards us and just as Azog lifted his sword I blew hard on the dog whistle I had gotten Alex to send me since the first time we'd come across Wargs.

Gandalf had told me that Wargs were basically demonic wolves. Wolves have great hearing and are sometimes even disturbed by the dog whistle.

Somehow, for once Murphy's law did not occur, the worst did _not_ happen and the Warg was _not_ immune to the dog whistle. Instead it was super sensitive to it and stopped in its tracks hard, writhing in pain along with the other Wargs and Azog was thrown off it, instead tumbling over his butt and falling down. Unluckily Thorin was still down for the count and Bilbo and I were possibly the worst fighters in the group. Azog managed to find his bearing quite easily and just as he rushed forward towards us, the rest of the dwarves came onto the battlefield with battle cries of their own. Quite nicely done I thought.

And then eagles came and they started throwing the Wargs around before putting us onto their back and flying off into the distance.

Against all odds, we were alive. How the hell did that happen?!


	13. Chapter 13

I couldn't say how long we were flying but whether it was the worry over Thorin who looked like shit and hadn't woken up even though he was being held by a giant eagle or because we were all flying via giant eagle, I can't say.

But seriously, _giant eagles_. How?

And in between that and growing dread because Thorin might be _dead_ , I also found myself pitying Smaug.

I should have been cold and freezing and I was, I should have been in pain because the arm that had been popped back in was still quite sore and I was but I don't remember actually feeling any of that because I was on the back of a giant eagle and we were flying.

_Flying_.

Nothing compares to it, there are no words to describe what it's like, I felt like I could just put my hand out and I'd be grabbing little bunches of clouds like cotton from the sky. I could have fallen off and died and I wouldn't have cared because what a way to go.

And if Smaug was alive, if for all these years he'd just been sleeping in his bed of gold when he could have been flying, when there was this open sky to climb, higher and higher then I couldn't help but pity him.

Mine was one of the last eagles to land, I don't know if it was because he knew that I was in love with flying or what but he swooped from one side to the other and would suddenly fly low before climbing high again. So by the time I landed on the rock, Thorin was awake and blinking his eyes. He was alive and when he opened his eyes and started breathing heavily it was like whoosh, I didn't realise my heart was beating so fats until then.

We were just fighting for our lives. Literally, not just struggling to stay alive despite bad weather and geography but actually _fighting_ for our lives.

Thorin had nearly died.

Only he hadn't. Instead he was hugging Bilbo and talking about how wrong he was.

Things settled down a bit after that, from there we could see Erebor and that helped everyone recover way more than any of Oin's ointments and tonics did, me too because Erebor meant that Dale was close by which meant home was nearby. Once Thorin was done being checked I went over there and just looked at him.

Dude was alive.

"Yes?" He asked. Valid question really because I'd just been standing there looking at him for a while.

I punched his arm. Not my greatest moments but I punched it. Not hard or anything, it barley jostled him and I made sure to get his uninjured arm. But he did look at me like I was crazy.

Cannot blame him.

"What was that for?" Kili protested while Thorin just looked at me with his stupid blue eyes.

"I'm glad you're alive."

"OS you punched him?" Kili said in a high pitched voice. Thorin smiled and Fili smirked.

"I do believe Thorin's been given Alessia's version of a hug."

I sneered at the blonde. Even though he was kind of right. "I don't hug people."

He snorted. "Clearly."

Damn it Aaron was right. I'm an emotionally repressed, frigid bitch.

Eh, could be worse.

Okay maybe it couldn't. I mean even Thorin hugged Bilbo. I am somehow more screwed up than Thorin is, which given the shit he's been through is really saying something.

Still, we had a bit of a moment there, all four of us. And then my phone rang and the moment was ruined.

" _Yo, did the magic tricks work?"_ Alex asked. I'd specifically told him not to call until the GPS on my phone put me far away from the mountain. I explained everything that had happened till then and then proceeded to be very surprised when he got huffy and worried. _"You got hurt?!"_

"I'm fine, just a bit of a scratch on my head and a dislocated shoulder that's actually not dislocated anymore because Oin popped it back in. You should see the other guys." And then I thought the statement over. "It probably hasn't made much of a difference though because those goblins were ugly even before I got through with them."

" _But you had to fight?!"_

"Umm yes? Why are you so surprised, what did you think I asked you for the sword for?"

" _Bu-but-! Where's Thorin I have to speak to him! He promised he'd try to keep you safe."_

"Oh Thorin's injured worse than I am. We were afraid he was going to die."

" _WHAT?!"_

"Relax, he's not. Gotta go now, we have a long trip ahead of us."

" _Where are you?"_

"At the very tip of a narrow rock. Don't worry it's got stairs carved into the side."

And then the long climb down began.

* * *

The eagles had given us one hell of a head start but unsurprisingly the Orcs cut it down pretty quickly. We had far too many people who were injured in our party and they were on Wargs, it wasn't really unexpected. Pretty soon they were so close that we had to actually send Bilbo to scout to see how close they were before we could make our move. While everyone sang Bilbo's praises because he hadn't been caught he got annoyed and yelled that there was something else out there. And as per usual Gandalf wasn't surprised by that at all. Seriously, why is that guy never surprised?

He even guessed at to what kind of beast was out there. Apparently something like a giant bear.

Then Gandalf announced there was another place nearby, a house where we could go but that the owner didn't like dwarves. I'm beginning to think I made a huge mistake by not setting out on my own.

And then it was back to the running as the Orcs caught up. Always with the running. I could have biked it since my pack was one of the few ones still intact but Gandalf was leading the way and unless I found him one as well I would be lost. And Azog had seen me defending Thorin so I couldn't' exactly cut my losses and take another way either.

We could actually see the house when a sound something like a lions' roar crossed with an elephant's cry resounded through the whole damn forest and it motivated us enough to run like the wind. Bombur was apparently so motivated that eh outpaced all of us, Thorin actually looked a bit offended when he passed the two of us in one quick trot. It would have been funny if the giant bear hadn't just burst out of the foliage and then begun gunning straight for us. We ran into the house but fumbled with the doors, they were so tall that in our adrenalin-ed state we couldn't figure out how to open or shut them. And then the bear's mouth was shoved through the space between the two doors and he snarled and bellowed as we tried to shut it out.

Its nose was the size of my head. No joke. I don't know what possessed me but I picked up a bunch of hay and smacked it on its nose like it was a dog but it made it sneeze and the moment of vulnerability was enough for us to manage to close the doors on him.

"What is that?" Ori asked.

"That is our host." Gandalf answered.

Of course he was. Not our host's pet, or the animal that the host was trying to keep from the beehives, no that was of course, our host.

And I had bopped him on the nose with hay.

Consequently I did not find myself able to sleep that night.

"You aren't sleeping?"

I all but screamed, jumping away when Thorin said that. Last I'd checked everyone's eyes were closed. And I was right, Thorin's eyes were shut but he was smiling, clearly amused at the way I'd leapt into the air.

"What are you doing still awake?"

"Waiting to see if the skin changer returns." He said gravely before continuing in a softer tone. "You should go back to sleep."

"I'm fine, used to not sleeping a lot. Actually I've slept more in these last few months travelling with you all than I have in the whole of the year prior."

"Indeed?"

"I usually don't sleep easily. And I'm a light sleeper so the smallest noises wake me up. One time I couldn't sleep for three whole days just because there was a fly in my room that kept buzzing."

"And what keeps you up on the other nights?"

I shrugged. "Just stuff. It's hard to stop thinking sometimes, that's all. Too many things to worry about." I changed the subject because it was making me uncomfortable. "You're getting along much better with Bilbo."

"I'll admit that I may have misjudged the halfling."

"Hobbit, they don't like the term Halfling because they aren't half of anything. I'm glad you trust Bilbo, he's a good person. And he's here for the right reasons."

"And we aren't?"

I hesitated because while I've been thinking this for a long time, I don't think Thorin will take it very well. But some things need to be said anyway.

"You're here for the gold. And the glory. Which would be perfectly fine if it wasn't for the fact that you aren't admitting it because _that_ is worrying."

"I assure you-"

"Don't. You can't convince me otherwise. You're wasting your breath. And I'm not convincing you either but I just want to make sure I say it." I took a deep breath. Thorin wasn't happy at what I'd said but then again neither was I. "But Bilbo's good. He isn't here for your gold."

"And how do you know that?"

"Thorin, had you seriously not noticed that all your company dropped in on him out of the blue and he still had enough food to go around? Or that he had enough room in his smial for all of you? That he doesn't exactly have a job that he needs to take days off of? Bilbo's rich already, he's never needed the gold. He signed a frankly terrible contract where he's all but willed away his life. Literally, it included funeral arrangements! Oh man, if I were his lawyer the only way he'd be signing that contract would be over my dead body." I still shudder to think of that contract but before I could linger on the though he cleared his throat. "Right, going off topic. Bilbo is good, trust him."

"Indeed. And what about you?"

"Oh no, don't trust me. I will say whatever I have to say to get back home, I will squeal like a bloody pig if I have to. Seriously don't tell me anything. I like living very much and all that honour stuff that you guys talk about means little to nothing to me."

"Honour means nothing to you?"

"I know that people can do the worst possible things in the name of honour. Here you are trying to fulfil the legacy of your family and uphold their honour."

He tilted his head looking like a confused little owl. Well a confused little owl with a honking sword held loosely in his hand. "And what is wrong with that?"

Do I really need to point this out?

"Your grandfather led a charge against an ancient city that ended in countless deaths while in the throes of a sickness. And you didn't even get the city back. You father...well to be honest I'm afraid to ask but since you're the one leading everyone I'm guessing he's out of the picture. That's not exactly a legacy you want to fulfil."

A muscle in his jaw ticked and he snarled silently for a brief moment before settling into a neutral expression but when he spoke his voice was rougher than usual. "What's your legacy?"

"Stupidity resulting from far too much intelligence. And going out in a ball of flames."

"...What?"

And I explained all about my parents flying into the sun.

"You must not have been happy when they left."

"Eh, I'm almost never happy." I shrugged, then realised what I'd said. "That's so sad."

"Still your life at home was easier. I am sorry that you have had learn to shed blood." He said gravely. He does that a lot, being grave and broody and guilty.

"It's not you know. It's not the first time I've killed someone. So don't go about feeling guilty about that."

"It's not?"

"No. That happened way back when someone had tried to break into our home. They'd knocked my Nonna out and I hit him with a baseball bat. He had a brain aneurysm and just died."

I try not to think about it.

"So really don't worry about me killing, you have not defiled an innocent. Wait, that did not come out right." Even as I said it Thorin's eyes were wide and the faintest hint of a blush appeared. Of course it might just have been the scrape on his face from Azog's mace. "See, this is why I don't talk, every time I open my mouth something strange comes out of it."

At work they used to bet on how many double entendres I'd accidentally make. You know, the more I think about it, I realise that my work colleagues were actually my friends. And that all those work dinners were just us hanging out. I had friends and I didn't even know it!

And apparently Thorin's a friend too. He was keeping watch of the door and I was...me. So we stayed up talking. We came up with a suitably vague answer that I could give if captured for information and discussed war strategies (his came from experience, mine form playing video games). And then he told me about Erebor and the actual events of the day when Smaug came. At one point, I saw Ori wake up and begin to write all of it down.

But then came the time when we had to face Beorn who was outside splitting logs so loudly everyone woke up because they heard it. Gandalf suggested we go out in pairs so as to not startle him which was a good idea but I would have thought it a better idea if we waited until he was done with the logs. It didn't seem sensible to surprise someone while they have an axe in hand. OF course he could also turn into a bear at will so there was never really a good time to do so but whatever.

Bilbo and Gandalf went out first. It wasn't long before Bofur told me to go along with Balin.

"And who might you be?"

"I'm Alessia. And I wanted to apologise."

"Apologise?" He loomed over me. I mentally calculated how much it would cost him to get a full body wax done.

"I swatted you on the nose with a little bunch of hay. When you were in your bear form though."

"Did you now?"

"Yes. It's what I do to my brother when he gets a bit ahead of himself so…yeah. For some reason I thought it was a good idea."

"And was it?"

"Well you were surprised and backed off enough or us to close the door so in my opinion yes. In yours it might have been offensive so I'm sorry about that."

"Us? I did not think that the four of you had enough strength to close the doors of my house."

"We're not just four." Beorn took a deep breath and placed his hands on the handle of the axe while glaring at Gandalf.

"Is that so?"

"Yes we're actually a total of sixteen." I said while Gandalf was dithering. "But you see that's a lot of names to remember so we thought it best to come out in pairs. Especially with all the rhyming names the dwarves have, when I first met them I was confusing all of them with one another, sometimes I was just one letter off but somehow ended up offending people."

Then Gandalf took over on my part and ended up making Beorn angry by introducing the trickles of dwarves that were coming out in pairs.

But then Thorin stepped out and Beorn wasn't that angry anymore.

Turns out Beorn had been held captive by Azog and tortured along with others like him. He still had the shackles on his hands even and so Thorin really impressed him by the fact that he had cut off Azog's arm. Thank God for small mercies. He offered us shelter for a few days while we recuperated and then food and ponies to take us to Mirkwood. All this because he hated Orcs more than dwarves.

He caught me one time while I was alone and sat down next to me while compulsively sorted out all my things and made a list of things I wanted Alex to send me.

"And what is a human doing in the company of dwarves?"

"Is Gandalf not a human?"

"No he is not. He is one of the Istari, the one that the eagles of Manwe know as Olorin, the Maiar."

"That's a lot of words that I don't really know."

Beorn smiled indulgently. "He is not human of that you may be certain."

"Hmm okay then. Well I'm travelling to a place that's apparently a few hundred feet away from their final destination so I'm just tagging along really."

"And what would the name of the place be?"

"Dale."

"Dale? The ruins?"

"Yep, I'm...sort of supposed to be meeting my brother there."

Don't know if telling random people who turn into bears that I'm from another world is a good idea.

"Why do I get the feeling you're lying to me."

"Because I'm withholding information for my own convenience."

"You do not trust me." It was a statement not a question but it still made me snort and answer.

"No, why would I? Just because Gandalf says so? That's ridiculous, he's like Dumbledore, all about holding back information, letting people make mistakes even though the reason they make mistakes is because he's goaded them into a situation of his making to begin with. I don't trust him and I don't trust you. But I am a big fan of convenience."

"You have the eyes of an elf." Beorn stated out of the blue.

I lowered my voice and pointed at the dwarves. "Whatever you do, don't let them hear that. They will be rather insulted on my behalf."

"You aren't."

I shrugged. "I might be if I knew what you meant to say."

"You seem older than your years." He explained.

"Ah. That's not too insulting." I gave him a thumbs up.

Apparently that amused Beorn because he burst into loud laughter.

"You can sleep safe tonight little lady, the Orcs can't get to you here."

I didn't know how to tell him it wasn't the Orcs that were keeping me up at night but him. Wait, that doesn't sound right either.

Still I actually did get some sleep that night. That night at Beorn's, I slept better than I'd done in years, even compared to Rivendell. I didn't even want to wake up which if you knew me, would be strange.

I don't know why that sleep was so good. Maybe because we were finally over the Misty Mountains, maybe because we'd seen Erebor which made all the dwarves much better to hang out with, maybe it was because I'd flown on the back of a giant Eagle and it had been Glorious.

But I'm guessing it's mainly because those goblins and Orcs wouldn't follow us here and now Beorn was on our side too.

Still I was in that state of half awake and something fuzzy and kitten-like was snuggled up to me so I petted it. It purred and cuddled even closer, tickling me and I stretched.

"Ahem." The sound of someone clearing their throat was loud and I woke up. Thorin was sitting across from me and looking over something with a great deal of concentration, eyes pointedly avoiding me.

If he wasn't talking to me why'd he wake me up?

And so I closed my eyes and went back to sleep.

"Ahem." He cleared his throat again, louder this time and I woke up.

"What is it?" I asked as nicely as I could. Which was not very nicely because he'd interrupted my sleep.

"You might want to wake up and ah...check your clothes."

And that is when the reason for his pointedly avoiding me became obvious. My shirt had ridden up a bit and the cat was actually resting on my bare midriff.

I pulled it down with a roll of my eyes. "Jeeze it's just my stomach, not even an erogenous region." I mumbled but he'd heard me if the stricken look was anything to go by.

And then I noticed the cat was white with blue spots on him. And that it was Salt, as in Mrs Costanza's cat, Salt. Which is when things went to hell.

"Salt?!" The blue cat purred and licked my nose. I turned to Thorin with what must have been a wild look on my face if Thorin's flinching away was anything to go by. "What is he doing here?!"

"Uh I..." Thorin looked between me and the door so I went out. There I made straight for Beorn, ignoring everyone else around me. I'd seen him talk to his horses the day before, along with the dogs and cats and the mice so I put Salt up to his face.

"You, talk to the cat and ask him what he's doing here!" Beorn was just amused and before he could answer, a shout in a very, very familiar voice called out to me.

"Hey Ally!"

Alex of all the people not in this world but actually from mine, was standing in the courtyard across from Kili and Fili. Alex.

So, that heart attack I was anticipating? That just happened.


	14. Chapter 14

I actually did have a heart attack, mild but still a heart attack. Shooting pains up and down my left arm and my chest hurt and cold sweats. But while the dwarves (sans Oin) freaked out Alex was well prepared for that, we'd both taken courses on emergency first aid and Oin was an awesome healer as well. So after an hour or so I was fine, just had to take it slow.

But it was hard to take it slow when my brother, who was supposed to be in another world, was here instead. Especially since when I last talked to him he said that I needed to be in Dale to get back home.

"How did you get here?!" I flailed. Oin fussed and made me lie down before tucking me into a burrito like thing using some blankets he'd gotten from Beorn. I was soon swaddled like a baby and unable to move except slight wriggling motions.

"Well you know how we were talking about Doctor Who the last time?"

"You mean when you said you were the Doctor and I said you were the Doctor whose Tardis wasn't working and who'd dropped off his companion in another world?"

"Yes, exactly, so that got me thinking and I figured that instead of finding a way to make a portal that doesn't just splinch any living being in half, I should create a device that can keep that person safe instead. So I made a Tardis."

"Please tell me you did not test it out on yourself?"

"Don't be silly," He waved me off. Like I was being silly and that thought had never occurred to him. I _know_ how his mind works, he had definitely thought of it. "I tested it with Salt first."

"Do you want to be killed by Mrs Costanza?!"

"Don't worry, Salt was sulking anyway. I think he missed you."

Sort of believable because even right now Salt was hissing at Alex and insisted on taking up residence inside my shirt under the blankets. His head was poking out of the neck hole along with mine. It was actually a stress release to feel his fur tickling my sides.

"Okay but you said Dale was where I was supposed to go."

"Yes and that's where I ended up too. But I got a jet pack along and flew here."

"Why?!"

"Because you got hurt. And it's my fault you got stuck here in the first place, I didn't want you to do this alone."

"That's...actually kind of sweet." Really sweet. Especially since he's actually kind of afraid of the outside world and I usually have to drag him kicking and screaming everywhere. The only place he's willing to go is Disneyland. Of course, now I wouldn't just have to make sure I stayed alive but Alex too. That is not good at all. But perhaps there was a way out of this. "So where are the other jet packs?"

"Other jet packs?"

"The ones you brought along so that we could fly back to Dale and get back home as quickly as possible of course."

"Oh. I didn't think of that."

Of course he didn't think of that. Because he might be able to prove String Theory but he has no common sense at all. I'm going to die.

"But it's cool, now we can go with the others!" He said excitedly.

"Yes we can through Mirkwood. Filled with Elves who intensely dislike Dwarves. And is apparently home to giant spiders. And apparently the forest itself is cursed and poisonous."

Alex shot me a weird look.

"How do you know that?"

I shrugged. "I eavesdropped on Gandalf and Beorn. We should go around the forest, I know _they're_ on some kind of deadline and it's faster through Mirkwood but we're not! We can totally go around the forest."

Alex's face fell. "But I thought we could go with Fili and Kili."

Because of course, the only real life/not online friends that he manages to make have to be dwarves in another world. Of course.

And now I had to decide between furthering his development by going along with the dwarves or going safely around the forest.

It shouldn't be that difficult a choice really, but this is the first time in ages that I have seen Alex so excited about people and actually take initiative to do something. I can't just keep mothering him the rest of his life, that wouldn't be fair to him. Besides, every time I try to tell him what to do he brings up the fact that I was emancipated by the time I was fifteen.

"You know, when I said you need to get out more and meet people, this is not what I meant." I said instead of answering him but he knows me well enough to read in between the lines.

"We're going with them?"

"Yes, fine."

I'm so going to regret this.

* * *

Yup, definitely regretting it. After biking it up to the edge of the forest while the Company rod eon ponies (which must have looked like quite a sight, Alex sitting on the bike rack holding on me to me with one arm and to the bag with the other) we went into the forest. The creepy forest with hallucinogenic air.

The first few days were fine, we hadn't finished the food or water so we were still in high spirits and with Alex there continuously asking questions while we walked things were fairly cheery considering that the darkness seemed to be pressing down on us and the canopy was so thick it wasn't letting any proper light in at all.

"What did you do in Erebor Mister Bofur?" Alex asked, both arms on my shoulder as if we were pretending to be a train like when we were kids. The path grew narrow at times so we were all actually walking in one line at that point. On instinct because Alex usually doesn't talk to people, he talks to _me_ , I answered his question.

"He was a miner."

"Oooh, really lass?" Bofur teased. "And how do you figure that?"

"Your axe is a pick axe. And I've picked up things here and there."

"Like what?"

"You are most fascinated when Gandalf does a trick that involves breaking stone. That would be something all of you are interested in seeing as how most of the crafts in Dwarven culture relate to the stone in some way or another but you in particular asked about how specifically Gandalf can break rock and if there was a technique to it. Plus there's the fact that you have the best eyes in the dark and I'm guessing that you wear the hat at all time because you were used to wearing some sort of protective headgear while in the mines unless all that talk of Dwarves having hard heads was literal."

I went ahead for a while before realising that the whole company had stopped and was staring at me in surprise.

"What?"

"Why didn't you just ask?" Bofur asked amused.

"Well I thought it might be a sensitive topic given that you're a toymaker now. Probably because the Blue Hills don't have mines. Besides, I didn't want to be nosy."

"Be nosy all you want." Bofur patted my back.

And that was the last time we had any sense of fun. After that we ran out of supplies pretty soon, the magic of the path and forest in general meant my pocket dimension was useless, not that it could have been useful anyway since Alex was here instead of back home. And then Bombur fell into the water and was unconscious and we had to carry him. Luckily Alex and Bifur came up with a way of using my bike as a sort of towing device and attached wheels to the stretcher they'd made so it would drag easily.

The air in that forest was just so strange. It was so heavy and thick that we were all panting, trying to breath with our mouths but somehow still gasping for air. Between the light-headedness and the seemingly unending nature of the forest, we were not doing so well and ended up going off the path. The path that Gandalf had very specifically told us not to go off of. In our defence, being high as heck meant that at the time it seemed like a very good idea. We just walked and walked and walked and sometimes in between walking it felt like we were going backwards, other times like we were walking on air. I followed Alex's arm around my shoulder only to find that there were two of him on either side.

At one point I actually wondered when Alex got himself a twin. So freaking high.

But then everyone started shouting and fighting which Thorin subdued with a single shout.

"Enough! Quiet, all of you!" He shouted and everyone quieted right down. Thorin may be terrible with directions but he's great at getting people to listen to him. "We are being watched."

And then the high wore off as adrenaline coursed through pretty much everyone there. In the canopy above us, red eyes glowed and they came closer and closer the strangest clicking sounds preceding them and swords were drawn all around and Alex cowered behind me while Salt dug in his claws into my torso. Normally that would have had me screeching and running around in pain but at that point it was pretty much the only thing keeping the light-headedness at bay.

We pulled back, forming a circle but it was no use. One by one we were all picked off and still recovering from the daze we were in, we had no means of defending ourselves. The only thing I remember is hearing Alex scream and turning around only to feel a sharp pain in my back and then nothing.

Next thing I know I'm waking up covered in spider webs.

There is no feeling more gross than that of sticky strands that cling to your skin and clothes. Seriously, nothing. I thought that was bad enough but suddenly spiders were crawling down the trunk of the trees making their way down to us.

We fought them off quite valiantly but with the spider's poison still making our moves sluggish Alex and I weren't much help. But the dwarves were damn good, but they were also after all just a few dwarves against many giant spiders. It didn't seem like it was going to end well.

And then the elves came. Out of nowhere really, just jumping and ducking and sliding along the trees, killing any spiders in their just before coming to a halt right in front of the dwarves. I was glad to see them for all of a second before I realised that they were pointing all their very pointy arrows straight at us. And that Alex was missing.

"Do not think I will not kill you dwarf. It would be my pleasure." The blonde one in front of me said to Thorin who was right next to me.

Sounds of screaming came from somewhere off to the side and I realised it was Alex and Kili.

"Son of a bitch-" I went to help but got an arrow in my face for my troubles.

"And what is a human doing in the company of dwarves?"

I might have used some rather rude language. And then proceeded to shout for Alex.

I did end up getting a few extra arrows pointed at me for that.

Luckily in the next few moments a girl elf came along shoving Kili and Alex ahead of her.

I saw the look on Alex's face. That utterly idiotic, besotted look. The same one that Kili had actually. This was going to be problematic to say the least.

"Search them." Blondie ordered and then proceeded to do exactly that. He was rude about pretty much everything, especially so about Gloin's locket.

Course then it was my turn and I had some pretty interesting stuff on me. Apart from the phone and the makeup and the wipes I was carrying there was also the mask and voice modulator from the stint back in the caves, the sword and then the hologram projector.

"What's this?" Blondie asked, regarding my phone and projector.

"Mirrors. I'm vain." It's a good thing I'm actually vain and the phone case is mirrored.

Then he turned his attention to Thorin's sexy sword. By the looks of it he was a bit in love with it.

"Where did you get this?" He asked Thorin. Well 'asked' isn't exactly right, more like demanded.

"It was given to me."

"Not just a thief but a liar as well." Blondie pointed the sword at Thorin's neck which is when I cut in.

"Transfer of ownership of the sword known as Orcrist was sanctioned by Elrond, Lord of Imladris, the Last Homely House East of the Sea, in the presence of Gandalf the Grey, the Istari known as Mithrandir to the elves and bearer of Glamdring. So under the authority of Elrond, who by the way as a member of the White Council holds far more clout in Middle Earth than...any of you really, _you're_ stealing. And you will find that that makes _you_ the thief. A thieving Elf. Oh well, not everyone can be like Elrond I suppose."

"You offer me insult?" Blondie said.

"You offer Elrond insult by refusing to accept his authority." I insisted.

"Hmm. I shall keep the Orcrist under observation until a message can be sent to Elrond."

"Yes, because you're such a neutral party are you? And until then, I imagine it'll make perfect sense for you to use it."

"It should rightfully be mine to inherit." He protested.

"Your ancestors are also dead but you don't seem to want to inherit their death do you? Really, people think dwarves are greedy, tch tch tch."

"That's hardly-"

"Fair? Neither is calling travellers thieves just because they happened to go off the path. It's not like we wanted to end up as Spider food."

"You dare speak to our Prince that way?" One of the elves spoke up and the redhead who had escorted Kili and Alex quirked an amused eyebrow.

"You think you're in the presence of enemies and you're giving out the identity of your Prince so easily?" My general tone of 'You are a dumbass' was sensed if the tightening of the hand on the bow was anything to go by but Blondie put the sword back into its sheath and they began to lead us through the forest. Alex ended up next to me at some point.

"I'm in love." He whispered, his eyes set on the redhead's back.

My life sucks.


	15. Chapter 15

As a human and as someone with lady parts, I got special treatment. The others were kind of stripped of their armour and weapons and what not then and there itself but I got taken to another room by the redhead. Apart from a pat down I was asked to strip as well which got weird fast.

People wear a lot of layers here and one of those is the long-johns kind of thing which is where they stopped with the dwarves. But I wasn't wearing that.

So when the redhead asked me to take off the layer under my coat, I was standing there in my underwear and a slip.

"Aren't you cold?" She asked while I stood there awkwardly. Elves are apparently not as concerned with nudity. Not that dwarves were either, given how they had frolicked in Elrond's fountain (according to Bilbo).

"When I wear the coat it's not so bad."

"And what are those? Did you get mauled by some wild creature?" She pointed at the scratches left on my torso by Salt and I laughed.

"No that's just some scratches, Salt was really scared when the Spiders- Oh no, where's Salt?"

"What is Salt?" The redhead asked. I should probably get her name.

"Salt is a cat, he was with me when the spiders got me but I forgot, oh crap!"

"Is he the one with the odd fur?"

"Yes, where is he?"

My answer came in the long yowl accompanied by shrieking from outside the room. Tauriel left first and I followed but not before remembering to put my coat on.

I fell down on the floor laughing at what I saw. Blondie Prince was struggling with Salt who was basically ripping into him and escaping the elf's clutches by roaming around freely in his shirt. It looked painful but given that this was the same guy who'd been utterly rude to us, I had no sympathy for him.

"Perhaps it would be better if you called your beast back." The redhead said. Alex and Kili had been laughing as well but they'd stopped completely when she'd walked out.

"Now why would I possibly do that?"

Her lips twitched into a smile and her nose curled as if she was suppressing a snort. "Because if the cat gets into Legolas' pants we may lose the..."

"Royal Jewels?"

"Yes." She said in a strangled voice.

"Alright, Salt, darling, come back to me now." Since I was talking to salt in English and not Westron it earned me a fair few stares but for the most part the elves were just helping Blondie who was lurching. Meanwhile Salt had turned into the sweet, docile little thing he always was with me and was snuggling into my shoulder turning back only to hiss and snarl at Blondie.

"What is that foul creature?" Blondie's perfect hair was dishevelled and his armour was out of place. It looked like he'd been in quite a fight. Or like he'd been shagged into the ground.

"It's a scared cat who's been dealing with your Spiders." Poor Salt's fur was covered in webs.

We were lead further into the...Do you know I can't quite think of a word for it. I can't call it Mirkwood because we'd been walking through Mirkwood for ages now, this was just a specific part of it. I could call it the palace but it wasn't so much of a palace as an underground forest kingdom, only it was made up of the forest's roots rather than the trunks, branches and leaves. We walked for ages on narrow stone paths that resulted in Alex cowering behind me. He's a bit scared of heights and being one of the taller people in our midst he must have been even more scared than usual.

"Allie!" He cried out alarmed when an elf pushed him forward and he went a bit too much to the side, hanging on to my shoulders for dear life. Before I could threaten the elf though, the redhead said something sharp and pushed the dude to the back taking his place instead and Alex was suddenly much more brave, puffing his chest out like a peacock. Idiot.

Thorin was taken on a different route, one that led up while we were taken into the dungeons. We were all pushed into different cells, Fili and Kili's cells on the right of where Alex, I and Salt were. Blondie made an attempt to push me in but dropped his hand when Salt hissed at him.

The great elves that had fought off all those giant spiders, brought down by a cat. Priceless.

"Aren't you going to search me?" We heard Kili say and Blondie stopped and the four of us looked at Kili who was flirting with the redhead. "I could have anything down my trousers." He said, the little git. I snorted but Alex and Blondie fumed. Apparently Redhead had more than just the two fans.

"Or nothing." She said and closed the door on him.

"I'd go with nothing!" Alex said. "And any story he tells about cursed talismans is completely fake!"

Redhead smiled and went off with a shake of her head and Blondie followed stopping to glare at Alex and Kili one last time.

"What is wrong with you?" Kili hissed and Alex, sweet, innocent, stupid Alex yelled back.

"I saw her first!"

"If you're going by who saw her first," I interrupted the two idiots. "Then Blondie's the one who gets dibs."

"Oh please." Alex laughed and Kili concurred.

"That's ridiculous."

"Well as much you'd like to think she's into brunettes, she might have a thing for blondes you know. Though I've never understood the appeal."

"Hey!" Fili joined in.

"The Blonde elf has been friendzoned so hard he's little brother zoned."

Kili must have been spending too much time with Alex because he understood all that without anyone needing to explain things Surely friendzoning cannot be colloquial Westron? "There's no getting out of that zone." He added.

"I have dibs!"

"No you don't."

"Yes I do."

"No you don't."

This went on for a very long time. So long, in fact, that it was still going on while the others tried to break the doors of the dungeons by pushing themselves against it and when Thorin came back spitting hellfire.

"Did he offer you a deal?" Balin asked him but before I could hear Thorin's answer the door to our cell was opened.

"You there, humans, the King wants to speak to you." The elf said and we were taken back out. The dwarves protested of course but we didn't really have a choice and so we went.

The elvenking's throne was up high. Really up high. And we'd been held in the dungeons in the lowermost parts of the place which meant lots and lots of stairs.

Seriously, so many stairs. By the time we were in front of Thranduil Alex was pretty much crawling and I was breathing so hard I couldn't hear one word of what Thranduil was saying. Luckily he seemed to realise this and shut up pretty quickly, giving us some time to catch our breath and our senses. I was the first to recover and then I just waited for Alex.

And then my sweet stupid little baby brother bent down to put his mouth next to my ear and whispered. "Don't you have a dress just like that?" Thranduil who had been swooping around us creating an intimidating atmosphere stopped and glared at Alex. "Oh crap do you think he heard me?"

From the way Thranduil was snarling, that was a definite yes.

"And what brings two humans into the Woodland Realm? In the company of thirteen dwarves too." He sassed.

"Why is the King the one interrogating us? Surely you have spymasters and specialists who can get information out of us? Why you?"

"I'll be the one asking the questions." He said looking down his nose at me.

It's just hard to be intimidated by him. I mean just last year I had to break into HYDRA facilities to rescue Alex and that was much more scary. Especially since they thought I was a recurit and I had to spend an hour in a group discussion about preferred torture techniques. I learnt a lot that day. This in comparison is just...dull.

"Fine, ask." Apparently me giving him permission to ask just made him angrier because he was getting all sorts of twitchy.

"What are two humans doing in the Woodland Realm?"

"We veered off the path ended up lost and as Spider fodder."

"And where exactly where you headed to?"

"Santa Barbara, California." There's a joy in exploiting someone's wording. Thranduil said exact and I gave him exact. After all while we may be travelling through Dale and Erebor and all that crap, where we were actually heading was home in another world.

Muahahahahahahaha.

"I've never heard of this Santa Barbara."

"Well in your defence I don't think you get out much."

"You mock me?"

"Was I wrong in assuming that you don't go out of your Woodland Realm and even if you do it isn't to go visit human cities and see how they've changed? I imagine as King you can't really leave your kingdom much anyway."

He snarled. I smirked.

"And what of your company, where are they headed?"

"Wouldn't it be better if you just asked them? After all do you really think the dwarves being so secretive would entrust their destination with two paltry humans?" Pissing off millennia old elves is so much fun! They don't really show it outright but they get all twitchy!

"If you will not talk then I-"

"I talked. I answered your questions. Just because the answers don't satisfy you doesn't make them false. If you didn't want to hear what I had to say then you shouldn't have asked me anything at all." He sniffed and told the guards to take us away.

Halfway down the stairs Blondie and Redhead were suddenly there. Alex made mooney eyes at Redhead who went up the stairs while Blondie changed directions and decided to accompany us instead.

"Did your talks with my father go well?" He asked and I shrugged.

"He didn't really want to listen to what I had to say."

"My father has grown more...hard in the past centuries."

I didn't respond and instead took note of Orcrist hanging at Blondie's side. "I see you're keeping Orcrist under _very_ close observation."

He flushed. "I was on my way to put it away actually."

"Right." I drawled out putting all the possible sarcasm I could into that one sound. It was a _lot_ of sarcasm. Enough that Blondie actually made the guards wait while he put it away in a room that also held the rest of the company's stuff, I could see Dwalin's axes there as well.

"Take her up to the rooms." Blondie ordered but I stayed put.

"I'd much rather be in the dungeons."

"But why?" He asked, confused. "Would you rather stay in the dungeons?"

"Well yes. I mean I'm not sure that _I_ can sleep at night knowing that the spiders are so close, it was after all, a surprisingly short walk to here. The dungeons are the farthest away from any point of entry or exit so I'd prefer to be there."

"No spiders will get you here."

"Suure, but I'd still rather the dungeons. And it'll be easy for you all as well to have all the prisoners in one place."

A loud beeping noise from Alex interrupted us.

"Hey Allie, it's your birthday!" He said.

"Oooh best birthday ever! I am alive with happiness." I said flatly.

"You're twenty three years old, congratulations!"

"Joy."

Blondie looked at me weirdly. "You're twenty three?"

"Now I am."

"But that is only little over two decades."

"So?"

"Well, you seem much older than that."

Asshat. No wonder the redhead friendzoned him.


	16. Chapter 16

That deadline of Thorin's was really the main problem we had. I mean I had no doubt that after a few weeks or so, Gandalf would be coming in to save us or that eventually Thorin would just give in and accept Thranduil's deal so I was pretty chill. Plus Bilbo was still out there somewhere, I had complete faith that he was alive. Mainly because the doors of the prison couldn't keep Salt in and he had taken to wandering the halls and returned one day with a letter attached to his collar that I had left an answer to. Hopefully Salt had found him.

But the rest were still pretty damn despondent.

"I'll wager the sun is on the rise." Bofur slurred. "Must be nearly dawn."

"Actually it's a little over seven in the morning." Alex said helpfully.

"And how do you know that?" Bofur asked.

"My watch works." He shrugged and raised a fist for me to bump. "Good thing you talked me out of the digital one."

"Those things looks ugly, this is classic." The leather strap and square dial looked all kinds of awesome. But everyone else was still so gloomy that even Alex's attempts at bolstering them up by singing Bohemian Rhapsody had gone unappreciated.

"We're never going to reach the mountain are we?" Ori sulked and out of nowhere and when I say nowhere I mean no freaking where, appeared Bilbo.

"Not stuck in here you're not." He said and jangled the keys to our cells along with most of the weapons slung over his shoulder in a sack.

"You got my answer!"

I had in my letter given him directions to the room where I'd seen Legolas (found out his name after the fifth time he came in to make sure I didn't want a room) put away Orcrist.

"You were right, Legolas came in so often to look at Orcrist it was unlocked half the time." He said and opened the doors. Once all of us were out and we'd stopped talking quite that loudly Bilbo led us down the stairs instead of up which was a bit puzzling. But soon we were in the cellars which had a pile of barrels being guarded by two sleeping elves . "Everyone climb into the barrels quickly."

"Are you mad? They'll find us."

"No, no, they won't, you must believe me." The dwarves squabbled while Alex and I settled ourselves in barrels.

Alex poked his head out and leaned in. "My barrel smells like apples, yours?"

"Kind of musty, maybe clothes?"

Eventually the rest climbed in once Thorin ordered them and then Bilbo pulled a lever and we went tumbling down into an underground stream.

Unfortunately Bilbo had failed to consider how he would get down and so we were just bobbing there awkwardly, waiting for him to come down when he fell in with a splash.

"Well done Master Baggins." Thorin said from the barrel up front and I pulled Bilbo into my barrel. The others were too big but Bilbo and I fit in the barrel quite comfortably. I didn't even want to think about how much Alex's knees were going to hurt if he had to fold his tall frame into one of these things. But of course, Salt who absolutely hated water was the worst off out of all of us and he was making Bilbo and me miserable. He kept on trying to climb out of the barrel only to find himself staring at water and then climbed back in and the out again, as if expecting the result to change.

But he is a cat, I shouldn't expect anything else, especially since he was panicking with the water. Poor baby. So it was back to under my shirt for him while Bilbo and I put our hands out on either sides and began paddling until the stream turned downhill and all we had to do was wait.

Only the problem remained that there was a gate on the water and we weren't exactly very inconspicuous. We became even less inconspicuous when horns were blown and elves came out from the woodwork and the gate was shut by the dude manning it. They drew their arrows and pointed them at us waiting for the command when they were shot out of their perches and then Orcs appeared.

Seriously, we just cannot catch a break.

"Allie, use your scarf!" Alex yelled from up ahead.

"Use my scarf?"

"Lasso!"

And I did. It didn't take much just one throw and I had it firmly wrapped around the lever but the lever itself was too heavy and no amount of pulling was working. Consequently I put Salt into Bilbo hands and put my whole weight onto it which pulled the lever but also swung me out of the barrel and I was flying through mid-air, screaming the whole way and landed finally in the water next to Thorin's barrel.

"Hi there."

"Get in!" He yelled but I knew very well there wasn't any space and just clung onto the outside.

You'd think that was the end of it but even more Orcs appeared and even though we were out of the gate, Legolas and Tauriel (Kili had found out her name and gloated about it) followed killing the Orcs and trying to get us as well.

We floated down the river onto rapids which were so furious the arrows the Orcs shot at us wouldn't hit right because of how fast we were moving. Between that and the foaminess of the water, they couldn't quite keep a track of us but eventually the stream cleared out and then a battle began.

It was a good thing Bilbo had gotten the weapons because we were using them a lot. We slashed , hacked, shot arrows and threw branches at them, at one point Bombur was levered out of the river still in his barrel and kicked out the bottom of the barrel, stuck his hands out with axes and spun into this swirling vortex of blades which was all kinds of epic. And then Legolas came out and began shooting arrows at Orcs while balancing himself on Dwalin's head.

Head. Dwalin. What?!

And then he sued everyone's heads as stepping stones to cross the stream and get to the other side where he began slashing the Orcs there!

Eventually the fighting stopped because the stream was widening and they were running out of ground to stay on. The current took us for quite a ride and we were all nearly drowned by then. Once it had slowed down a bit more I climbed back into my barrel only for Thorin to yell at us to make for shore.

Barrel riding on rapids? Not fun.

"On your feet, there's an Orc pack on our trail, we keep moving."

"To where?" Balin asked, annoyed.

"To the mountain, we're so close." Bilbo answers.

"A lake lies between us and that mountain. We have no way to cross it."

"So we make one." Alex shrugs. "Cut down a few of those trees and make a raft, won't take much really."

"These waters are dangerous we cannot pass them without an experienced boatman."

"We go around it. At least we have our weapons." Thorin said. "We leave in two minutes."

"Do not move." Another voice said while we were attempting to wring every last bit of water out of our clothes which given the amount of water in them was a hard task. We turned to see a dude with bow and arrow pointed straight at us.

Okay so that barrel ride had wrecked me properly. I was pissed off, cold, angry and tired of people shoving arrows in our faces.

Consequently I began cursing. Quite a lot. And for a long time too. In every language I knew which at point was Westron, English, Italian and a few Sindarin curses that I'd learnt from Lindir when he'd once been walking back from dealing with the dwarves.

It was apparently enough for everyone to put down their weapons, including the guy with the arrow.

"I apologise for my outburst. But I'm not fond of people shoving arrows in my face."

"Excuse me but um, you're from Laketown if I'm not mistaken." Balin said. The man ignored him and continued looking at me weirdly, as if he couldn't quite believe his eyes. "That barge over there, it wouldn't be available for hire by any chance?" Balin continued despite the lack of response.

"Are you looking to get to Laketown?"

"Yes. We will pay of course and-"

"No need."

I was not the only one surprised.

"Wait what?" Alex said. "And stop staring at my sister! It's weird."

"Why would you offer us help and ask for nothing in return?" Thorin asked, suspicious.

"You have a child amongst you, he does not need to be dragged around needlessly." The man answered.

"And why does the child's plight concern you?" Thorin asked and Balin must have been afraid of offending the man because he piped up.

"No doubt he has his own bairns."

"Aye, and this one's barely older than mine." I didn't buy it; he hadn't even noticed Alex when he'd offered to take us to Laketown free of charge. "But I would ask for one thing in return."

"What is it?" Balin was cautious.

"Your names?"

"Yours first." I interrupted before anyone could say anything. Something about the dude did not seem right. But he didn't take offense and just smiled a crooked smile.

"Bard."

"...Seriously? What do you sing?"

He laughed, loud and clear and it made him look very young suddenly. Far too young to have a son around Alex's age really.

"You are not the first person to ask me that. But Bard is my name although I am no troubadour. And you milady?"

"Alessia Medici." I said and climbed onto the barge.

"Alex." My widdle brother followed.

"Kili."

"And Fili."

"At your service." They bowed and climbed on board next to Alex. The rest followed similarly and soon we were on our way to Laketown.

It wasn't hard to see what Balin meant when he said just building a raft wasn't enough. The water was cold and ice laden, the fog so dense we couldn't see anything and then there were pillars jutting out that we very narrowly avoided. It was obvious that Bard knew his way around there well because he was pulling a fairly wide barge through all the spaces he could find.

"So, apparently Laketown has someone called the Master in charge?" I asked.

When we'd stopped at the inn before the Misty Mountains, Áki had told me about the Master of Laketown being a very greedy, annoying man. Apparently Áki had run an inn there before the Master had made life hell for him.

Bard shot me an amused look. "The Master was...relieved of his duty a few years ago."

"By his successor no doubt."

"Yes, my sister was successful in taking the reins of Esgaroth. Were it not for her we would still be dependent on the Elves of Mirkwood for all our trade."

"Your leader's a woman?"

"She likes to go by the title Chief."

"Ah."

This would make negotiations difficult. A greedy man like the one that had been described to me would have been easy to sway with a few promises of gold but a woman who'd all but forced him out would be harder to convince and we would inevitably need some help. Alex was sniffling way too much and Bilbo hadn't eaten for a long time because he was too busy hiding and he wasn't taking the barrel riding too well either. And we had no food with us, only weapons.

I was still stuck on exactly why Bard let us go through. I mean he didn't ask for anything at all, that's not normal behaviour. Instead he just asked us a few odd questions and decided to take us to Laketown, why? Out of the kindness of his heart is a suspicious answer. Plus he kept on looking at me and Alex weird. I was almost in agreement with Dwalin's plan of throw him overboard. Course when I asked anyone there if they knew how to steer the bloody thing they pouted. And even if we did figure out how to steer that thing on our own, Alex said if we didn't know where the rocks where coming from the barge would be shattered on the rocks easily.

Soon we reached Laketown. And apparently Laketown is a town on the lake, not on the shores of a lake like I expected. It was like a rickety wooden Venice where none of the buildings were level and most seemed to be on their way to becoming the leaning towers of Pisa. That would be utterly cool and awesome if we weren't a hop, skip and a boat's ride away from a fire breathing dragon. This close to a dragon I would _not_ live in a wooden house.

We got some odd looks when the barge pulled in and the gate dropped down so that we were barred from entering into the town.

"Halt! Goods inspection. Papers please." A man said and came out with a lantern. That's how gloomy the place was, only one in the afternoon and it felt like night was about to set in. "Oh it's you Bard and...Who's this?" He looked at us all suspiciously which was quite a relief. Finally we were getting the reaction we deserved.

There is something very wrong with me.

But he stopped when he looked at me, his eyes grew wide and inhaled deeply. "Bless my soul."

"Okay what is going on here?" I asked but got ignored completely by Bard who was just looking at the gate keeper smugly.

"I think the Chief would let this one go." Bard said meaningfully and the man went in and lifted the gate, still looking at me with wide eyes.

"Okay, what the hell is going on here?"

Again I got ignored and instead he parked his barge and led us through the market. Everyone there stopped and stared and we all huddled up a bit closer. Soon we reached the biggest building there and Bard told us to wait there.

"We should leave this city of Men." Thorin said and I couldn't help but agree.

"It's weird. I don't like it."

Balin sighed. "We don't have to like it, we just need to get supplies and be off."

Just then a drunken man stumbled over to us and clapped Alex over his shoulder hard. Alex shrugged his arm off and that apparently made the drunken man get angry. "What's the matter boy?"

"Oi get your hand off my brother." And then he proceeded to walk over to me.

"Aren't you a sweet piece of-"

I grabbed the collar of the man who was threatening Alex and pulled him down to my eye level twisting his ear hard. He nearly toppled over and I almost passed out just from his alcohol breath. "Listen putz, you threaten my brother again and I will gut you like a fish. _Alive_."

He shook and began screaming. "Not another one." And then proceeded to run away straight into the beam of one of the few sail boats there and was knocked out.

"Drunk people are stupid." I said but when I turned around everyone was staring at me in shock. It wasn't that surprising, they hadn't really seen me get crazy overprotective before but what was surprising was that Bard, who had stepped out of the building, was not shocked. He was amused and something else that I couldn't quite name. It made me suspicious. "What did he mean by not another one?"

"It means, Miss Alessia, that you reminded him of someone."

Which would sort of explain why people were staring at me. Still rude.

"The chief will see you now." He led us in and after a bit of waiting in line we were through to a damp room that was filled with paperwork. It was all over the place but still neat, order in chaos. All the multiple stacks were perfectly in line with each other which is really quite a hard task. And in the centre of it all was a woman who looked very much like me. She had the same nose as me, the same mouth, even our eyes were the exact same shape except hers were green and mine are blue and her hair was a more blonde version of me. Other than that and the wrinkles that she had but I didn't, we could have passed for clones.

She looked surprisingly well for someone who I'd seen die fifteen years ago.

"Hey, you look just like Allie." Alex noted and the woman continued to look at us, shaking.

"Alessia? Alexander?"

"How do you know our names?" Alex asked. I suppose it's not that surprising that he didn't recognise her, he was very young when he last saw her. There are photos of her but Nonna didn't like keeping them around so he hasn't even seen those in a long time, only grainy photos from the internet. But I knew who that was. And she told him who she was as well.

"I'm your mother."

Fucking Murphy's law.


	17. Chapter 17

I suppose it was supposed to be an emotional moment. The Chief certainly thought so since she was openly sobbing and all of the touched looks that the Company was throwing at me and Alex, hell Balin was actually tearing up a bit, certainly attested to the fact that they thought so. I don't know what Alex was thinking but _I_ was not feeling anything at all. My parents, Leonard and Lucille Medici died, end of story. Only apparently not.

"The wormhole you were talking about." I told Alex. "That's what Gandalf was talking about."

"What do you mean?"

"When I was at Bag-End and you said that there was a wormhole near Dale that had been active as far as twenty years back, Gandalf said that there'd been rumour of a falling star around fifteen years ago, that was the spaceship."

"Yes we landed there and walked for a long time before we were found by Bard and his wife. They took us in and taught us Westron, saved our lives so." The Chief said.

"Right. Great. Kudos. So, Chief, we need supplies and a boat."

And Chief stared at me in disbelief. As did the rest of the company.

"Allie this is your mother, aren't you going to say something?" Bilbo said quietly and I blinked.

"What am I supposed to say?" I whispered back.

"Just tell her you love her and you missed her!"

"But I don't and I didn't."

"Wait is that really?" Alex said in a voice that was far too light and I found he was very pale too. Not that he wasn't pale to begin with especially since we were rolling around in barrels in a very cold river before but this was dangerously pale.

And then he pitched forward in a dead faint.

"Damn," I wasn't exactly unused to this happening, if Alex isn't stress eating while under pressure he tends to faint so I'd caught him pretty easily. After that it was just a matter of getting him on my back and piggybacking him. "So can we rent some rooms?"

We did rent some rooms at the inn that apparently Bard and his family ran and I found the story about why the Chief was held in such high regards by Bard. I wrangled the story out of the woman who had come to set up my room, apparently Bard's wife had been sick and the Master had withheld the medical supplies claiming that they were far too important to be given to a peasant. The Chief had then proceeded to lead the town to revolt against his authority and saved Bard's wife.

They owed her a solid.

I however didn't. What was I supposed to say, 'Oh please, take over the role of mother, you know, the one you sucked so much at that I cried more when the nanny had to be let go because we couldn't afford her anymore since you left us up to our eyeballs in debt, than I did when you died. Doesn't matter that I'm grown up and don't need one anymore, just be my mommy again, would you?'

Yeah, not going to happen.

But there is the fact that she's in this world even though she technically belongs to ours. Does that mean we should offer her a trip back? What would that mean for the town?

Oh hell, I forgot to ask if the sperm donor is still alive.

Still, that's probably something I should discuss with Alex when he wakes up.

* * *

Thorin and the rest left me, Alex, Oin and Gloin there; apparently they didn't want us there ruining the negotiations. Fair enough really and Oin was also a fair bit busy remaking all his poultices and tinctures and what not while checking on Alex at regular intervals. The elves had taken all of his stuff all the while scoffing over how primitive it was. Then they'd gotten baffled by my medical kit of which I'd managed to salvage some things. I still had a few tablets of oxycodone and anti-allergens. If someone was in pain or got a pollen attack, I had the remedy. Otherwise we were screwed.

"How're you holding up lass?"

"...I don't want to talk about it. So how are you holding up?" Gloin had had to dip into his emergency stash of cash for the inns rent and he had not been happy about it.

"You never want to talk about it." Gloin snorted.

"And yet no one seems to take the hint and keeps on trying to make me talk."

"If my lad talked to me like you do did to her-"

"Like what? Like a stranger?"

"Yes."

"She _is_ a stranger. My parents died fifteen years ago but even before that they weren't exactly parents of the year."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean I have no happy memories of them. I remember them not being there, I remember the nanny trying to console me when I asked where they were and her saying that they'll be back soon only for them to leave out the door as soon as they got in. I saw their faces on TV more than in reality, but their backs, now _that_ was a familiar sight. So _you_ tell me Gloin, how exactly am I supposed to treat them?"

Seeing her there alive and fine to all intents and purposes, it kind of hurt. I remember watching it on TV as their spaceship went out of orbit and there was panic in the control room and then it being announced that their trajectory took them into the sun and that they were dead. I remember the news reporter who announced that bit was wearing a blue and white pinstriped shirt, grey suit and no tie and that his hair was slicked back ad he had a coffee stain on the cuff of his sleeve that he kept on trying to hide. I remember the wake and how there were very few people there, mostly colleagues of my parents from work. But mostly I remember that I was the only one who was crying. Alex was too young to even realise that they weren't there, Nonna was estranged really, she was only ever there to take care of us and their friends from work were either busy because they were working on the same project or not very good friends at all. I was the only one who cried.

And I thought that they must not get it, that my parents really were dead only I was the fool wasn't I? Because they were alive after all and none the worse for it.

Ghosts should not come back from the dead, it gets really weird.

"Look you...you won't understand. I mean the main reason you're here is because you want to provide a better life for your family." Every single person on the trip knew that, Gloin talked so much about his son and his wife that Kili and Fili would sit behind him and mouth his words along with him.

"And you don't think your mother does?" He said gently.

"She never did. Neither of them did. I won't blame them for being selfish; they just weren't cut out to be parents."

"But?"

"But nothing. That's it. They weren't my parents."

"That's not what _she_ thinks. She wants to be your mother."

"Gloin, she's been stranded on another world that is technologically behind the times to such an extent that she can't focus on the love of her life, her research. So she built a romanticised version of us in her head."

And we were not holding up to her expectations. But that was fine because she didn't exactly hold up to my expectations either.

Neither, I concluded as Thorin and the others returned rather grouchy, had she held up to their expectations. Although even I could have told them that their negotiations weren't going to go well, except for Balin no one in the group was actually aware of the concept of diplomacy.

"You should have taken me along." I said by way of greeting.

"I didn't want your past history getting in the way." Thorin growled before taking up a seat. Some would say that he sulked but really it was more of a pout.

"We could have used my history, I could have guilted her into it easily enough."

"Or angered her." Balin said.

"Yes because of all of us, _I'm_ the one who tends to offend people." I deadpan.

"Well that's that, we'll have to sneak out in the dead of the night and steal a boat, there's no way around it." Dori sighed.

"Sure there is, we make a trade." I am not fond of the concept of sneaking out and am pretty damn sure that Alex isn't really capable of it.

"They'd rather have their safety than money." Nori said. "I've found out more about the Chief, she's opened up trade between all sorts of human cities which is really saying something because this dump doesn't exactly have anything."

"Who said anything about money?" I scoffed.

"What do you mean?" Thorin was finally interested.

"I mean the Chief isn't from around here, Alex and I tell her we have a way back home and we see how she reacts to that prospect."

"You think she'd take it?"

"I'd like to say she would but then she's obviously had to adjust to the concept of living here and I don't know how much that might have changed her. But bad comes to worse, Is ay we threaten her."

"Not so sure we can do that, or even sneak out." Nori added. "They've put two boatmen to watch us and the whole town's been made aware of us."

"Look just...let me try. What've you got to lose anyway?"

They shared a long look. A very long look. Dwalin and Thorin and Balin's eyes ended up in some sort of weird three sided ping pong match just shifting from one person to another but eventually Balin sighed.

"Fine."

Finally a chance to put my PR training to use!

* * *

Yeah my PR skills have gotten rusty.

"I want out of here." I blurted out.

Not the best way to start negotiations.

"You seek to find your way into a dragon's lair; you would put us all in danger for gold."

"I don't give a flying fuck about the gold, I'm going home."

The chief blinked. "Home?"

"Yeah Alex can take us home." I left the 'us' there to see how she'd react.

"How is that possible?"

"Apparently quantum physics. And wormholes and he made Tardis. I don't know you'll have to ask him."

"And where is he?"

"Sleeping."

And because the Gods of luck do not favour me in the least it was at that exact point that Alex burst in while being restrained by Bard.

"I caught him sneaking around the building."

"I wasn't sneaking around, I was just looking to see how the supports work, I've never come across such a primitive system before." Alex sneered and Bard made a face and left with a huff. Lots of dramatic little bitches in this world, Thorin, Thranduil, Gandalf, event hat Azog fellow and now this guy. It's like they think they have some background music playing that they have to live up to by storming out of rooms and looking off into the distance. "Hey Chief."

"I hear from your sister that you found a way back into your world?"

And there go all my hopes of using that as a bargaining chip. If she's referring to it as 'your' then she is far too immersed in this world.

"Yeah we could give you a lift back too you know. I mean you'd have to find a way to forge papers and make up a new identity cause you...died, but other than that there's no limit to the interdimensional passage."

She quirked an eyebrow. It was creepy how much she looked like me, a sentiment that Alex apparently shared if the way he edged closer and then proceeded to hide behind me was anything to by. "And what of your father?"

Alex shrugged. "If I had one I'd probably think about it."

"You do have one!" She yelled. "You have a mother and a father!"

"I don't know you. At all. I don't even know _about_ you because my Nonna doesn't like talking about her daughter and son in-law except to call them reckless good for nothings. Allie doesn't like talking about you because she's afraid her opinion might influence me and since you died when I was one I don't remember you either. I don't have a conventional mother and father but I have an Allie and she's enough. More than enough really."

It is a good thing I have lots of experience stopping myself from crying because at that moment I wanted to blubber like a baby.

The chief also looked like she wanted to cry but for very different reasons but then she stopped herself and turned very cold very fast.

"Well then given all that, why should I possibly let any of you go?" She asked rather viciously.

"I don't think you're paying any attention to the big picture here." I said.

"And what might the bigger picture be?" asked Chief, angry.

"That on this long journey, despite our best efforts, most opposing faction we've faced has realised that we're on our way to Erebor."

"So?"

"So they all now think it's possible. With us, you get a warning, you get time to prepare for a possible dragon attack-oh and for the record, living so close to a dragon? Not the smartest idea.

With another party you might not have that option. They'll just creep up on the mountain and awaken the dragon. You won't realise until your houses are on fire that someone's woken up the dragons. You have the opportunity to hide which is more than anyone else can afford you."

"And if the dragon awakens? What then?"

"So what if he does? He's a dragon, you have no gold, he isn't interested in your town. Your town which incidentally, at a mere forty miles from the dragon, made entirely out of wood, was screwed anyway."

"So you suggest that we just sit here twiddling our thumbs waiting for the dragon?"

"No I suggest you start packing up and get to the shore and set up camp there for some time. And use camouflage for god's sake, surely it isn't that difficult?"

"There are...some issues concerning dyes."

"Look, there's no preventing this. If it doesn't happen now it happens a month later, if it doesn't happen a month later than a year later. It is inevitable. And what we are saying is that we are giving you the chance to prepare for it and that when we succeed, you get to benefit from it by rebuilding Dale and setting up the new markets there if you create a sense of goodwill."

"I'll have to talk to my advisors, we'll have an answer for you by the evening."

"Great and by the way, I meant to ask, is your husband still alive or-?"

"He's on a trade mission to Rohan, your Dad's still alive."

"Let's not use labels shall we?" I said and pretty much ran out dragging Alex with me.

In a few hours we had our answer. The good people would be giving us boats but only cram would be made available to us because the village was preparing for a winter on the lake shore.

And I didn't even have to be diplomatic!


	18. Chapter 18

We were so close to home that I could practically smell the processed sugar and extremely unhealthy junk food that had taken up space in my dreams as of late.

Unfortunately close wasn't as much close as it was on the other side of the lake. On our boats we were making steady progress out the waterways of Laketown whose people were packing and glaring at us.

Like we were the ones who had decided to live a few forty miles from a dragon. I roll my eyes in disdain.

Sure they might have been emotionally attached to it because a lot of them were descendants of people form Dale but sometimes emotion has to take a backseat to practicality and fire breathing dragon is one of those situations.

We rowed rowed rowed our boats and finally reached the shore. I figured after that it would be easy, right? I mean just walk a bit get to Dale and then after some time we'd soon be home. But no, because what happened after we reached the shore was more hiking.

Lots of it.

Up and up we climbed. It was so bloody exhausting.

"This wasn't that bad last time." Alex huffed before sitting down altogether.

"Last time you used a jet pack." That was bound to make things easier.

Things levelled out for a bit but then it was back to hilly stuff. After some more climbing we got to Dale and then a bit further ahead. The little GPS thingy that Alex had given me when I'd first rotten to this world started beeping and I pulled it out. Apparently we were standing right at the point Alex had told me to get to.

"Well this is us."

"Whoa whoa whoa," Alex was holding his hands up weirdly. "What do you mean 'this is us'?"

"This is where we sya goodbye to then and go home." I said slowly.

Thought it was pretty obvious to me.

"B-but I thought-I mean dragon-We're leaving?"

"Yes."

"But I wanted to see the dragon and see Thorin become king and-and"

I get the feeling Alex thinks we're in How to Train Your Dragon but really, this is more Reign of Fire.

"We're going home." I said firmly.

Bilbo laced his fingers together and started wringing them nervously and Thorin pouted some more but neither said anything. The rest however did say things, many things, loudly and all at once.

"Shut it and speak one at a time." They all looked between each other and Balin stepped forward.

"You can't just leave now lass."

"Why not?"

"But you're part of the company."

"...I want a shower. And pizza."

"Gandalf did say that it was fate that the Valar had a design for you in mind." Bilbo added tentatively.

"Look I love you guys, really I do. If I could kidnap you all and take you back with me to my world I would. But I can't and you're on your way to face a fire breathing dragon. There is no way in hell I'm letting Alex near something like that."

"He can make his own decisions Alessia." Gloin said and I smiled as sweetly as I could.

"Sure he can. Where's Gimli by the way I heard he really wanted to come on this trip too and he's definitely of age right?" And Gloin flushed hard. "Exactly, that's the point of being a parent, you make hard and unpopular decisions. I already regret not taking the long way around and going through Mirkwood which ended with us in captivity-"

"We got out." Kili protested.

"We got **lucky**. The spiders could have killed us all!"

"What if I promise to stay away from the action?" Alex negotiated.

"I thought you wanted to see the dragon."

"I'll see him when he's dead but Allie we let these guys go in without us and they're all dead."

"Oi!"

"Lad we're not incapable of taking care of ourselves."

"You're one to talk!" And the loud talking started again. I just tuned it out really.

Thorin jerked his head to the side and I followed him to a bit away from the rest.

"Look if you're going to tell me how I need to be there-"I started before Thorin could but got interrupted.

"I don't need you to be there," Thorin said as if it were hurting him to say it. "But I'd prefer if you were."

"Why though? I mean it's not like I have any particularly useful ability or-"

"These dwarves are fiercely loyal to me but that might not be the most important trait we'll need once we're in that mountain. I'd rather you were there because you don't just listen to anything I say blindly, if you think I'm wrong you won't hesitate to tell me that and if I don't listen to you you'll take things into your own hand. Bilbo can do that too but if he dithers...lives are at stake and he lacks the ability to take initiative the way you do."

"So you'd like me there because I am the equivalent of a brash rebellious teenager."

Thorin blinked. "...Yes."

"I'm sorry, I just can't risk Alex like that and if anything happens to me...he'll be all alone. I mean if you could have stopped Kili and Fili from following you here..."

"I would have. Well then," He stuck out his hand. "This is goodbye."

And for once in my life I decided not to be as emotionally shut off and actually pulled him in for a hug. A brief one though because that's too much emotionally charged physical contact. I punched him in the arm after that just to break the weird atmosphere.

"Try not to die." I told him and then repeated that to the rest of them. "Alex we'll be going on."

"I think you're forgetting something." Alex said with a smug smile on his face. "I'm the only one who can activate the wormhole."

"You wouldn't dare."

"Try me."

I really hate the fact that Alex is blackmailing me but on the other hand I'm also quite proud. He's finally learnt how to manipulate people!

I mean I probably shouldn't be so happy about it but screw politeness, the world is full of sucky people and if you want to survive in it you must learn to suck too.

That didn't come out right.

"How about a compromise? We go back for an hour or so, you get your shower and pizza and we come back."

Thorin finally said something. "We cannot afford a delay, the sun will set soon and the last light of Durin's day is the only time when the door will reveal itself."

"How did you find that out?" Alex asked.

"Wait is that the deadline that no one told me about?"

I mean I knew there was a deadline but I didn't know anything else about it.

"There were moon runes on the map." Bilbo said.

What on earth are moon runes?

"Moon runes?" Alex asked.

"The light of the moon revealed hidden writing." Balin explained.

"So isn't it probably the moon's light that it's calling the last light of Durin's day?"

That made sense.

"Please Allie?" Alex was in full puppy eyes mode now and Kili was joining him in it. Bloody ridiculous.

But weirdly effective.

"Alex, dragon. Fire breathing dragon that has destroyed the city we just passed through and the one that they are about to enter!"

"Yes but I asked around about the black arrows and I can totally make one back in the workshop and you can get your guns."

That shook me. I mean the sword is lovely and all that but it's not a good long distance weapon. My guns, on the other hand, are. And I really would like it if my dwarves stayed alive and that seems pretty doubtful at this point.

Plus I could always pretend to agree with Alex and then tie him to a chair once we get home. I really like _that_ idea.

"Ugh fine, we'll do that." They all cheered. "You guys go ahead, we'll catch up."

They left and Alex pulled out some device that looked like a game console to me. Then again I do stick to PC games. But with a few presses of button and a flick or two we were enveloped in a blue light that steadily turned completely opaque. It began turning transparent again and then the outside world was our apartment.

I might have flung myself against the walls and swooned.

"Wow, you must really have missed home." Alex observed.

"You were away from it for a few weeks, I've been in Middle Earth for nearly a _year_." A year with no showers. I mean sure, Rivendell had a bath and so did a few inns along the way and I bathed in streams but no showers. "I'll order the pizza you apologise to Mrs Costanza and give Salt to her."

"I don't have him." Alex shrugs and I put the phone down with wide unblinking eyes.

"Holy shit, where's Salt?!"

"I thought you had him!"

"I thought _you_ had him! Oh shit now we _have_ to go back."

Alex threw his hand in my face pointing his finger at me in accusation. "Ha, I knew it, I knew you were going to back out of going to face the dragon."

"It's a freaking dragon, of course I was going to back out of it. Now where did you last see him?"

"I don't know, Laketown I guess."

"Great, you know what this means don't you? We have to absolutely make sure that we kill the dragon. Smaug cannot be allowed to hurt Salt or Mrs Costanza will kill us. She will find a way to get to Middle Earth and kill us, I'm sure of it."

"Seriously? Mrs Costanza? She wouldn't hurt a fly."

And I flail wildly. "Did you not do a background check on her?"

"No, it's just Mrs Costanza."

"Yeah, she's former CIA."

"WHAT?!"

"Damn it. Alright fine, I'm going out to get supplies, I'll pick up the pizza on the way and you get to work on the black arrows, we have only one hour."

When I came back half an hour later he was sitting on the couch eating funyuns and watching Jersey Shore. Honestly, what am I supposed to do with this boy?

"You were supposed to work on the black arrows!"

"I did, I finished making them." He said between fistfuls of funyuns. I do not understand the appeal of those things, I really don't. "Did you get the Hawaiian pizza?"

"Yes I did. Nonna's rolling in her grave now you know."

"Nonna's still alive."

"Yes but she dies a little bit every time you have pineapple on a pizza."

"If it's so wrong then why does it taste so delicious?"

"I'm going to shower, you start packing and for heaven's sake change out of those pants, I got you some that actually fit." The sight of his ankles and mismatched socks was hurtful to my eyes.

He went through the bags of shopping (it felt so good to be shopping, even if just for supplies) and frowned pulling things out of it.

"Why did you get mountain climbing stuff?"

"Well it's called the Lonely Mountain and we'll be climbing it. What do you expect, stairs just carved into the side of the mountain leading to a hidden magical door?" I snorted and went off to shower.

Nothing compares to a shower. Showers are awesome. So warm, so lovely and shampoo and conditioner are amazing, truly fantastic. And to have a shower of non-hard water which does not just leave my hair feeling ridiculously greasy is awesome. I stayed there until I was all pruned up and then finally after pizza and packing we got ready to go back. To face a dragon.

It's not until we were back near Erebor that I felt really stupid. I thought Thorin was misguided to go off and try to claim a city that was laid under siege by a dragon but then I'm going to do essentially the same thing to get a cat because I'm terrified of my neighbour. Priorities, man, priorities.

It didn't take long to catch up to them, I brought the bike along and Alex rode pillion. They were scattered and form the yells I gathered that they were still just looking for the hidden door and rode down the hill to where Thorin was standing, looking incredibly tired.

"Alessia, I thought you might have stayed back."

"I was going to but then I realised we'd forgotten Salt." I was still in the middle of taking off my helmet and Alex was taking out a miniature remote controlled helicopter fitted with cameras.

"So where approximately do you think this door would be?" Alex asked and Thorin pointed in a fairly specific direction. Alex got the chopper up in the air and handed the screen over to Thorin.

"Mahal's beard..." Thorin said faintly as an aerial view of the Lonely Mountain showed up on the screen.

"I highly doubt beards had anything to do with it."

Alex shrugged. "Who knows, maybe they did."

"UP HERE!" Bilbo suddenly shouted and Alex pivoted the camera around to see where Bilbo was pointing and Thorin and I saw in the screen, a staircase along with a giant statue of what was probably some very important dwarf carved into the mountainside.

"Hey Allie, would you look at that? Stairs carved into the mountain leading up to the hidden magical door." Alex smiled smugly and brought the copter back.

"You have keen eyes Mister Baggins."

Bilbo smiled and then turned back to see me and Alex. "Allie, Alex you're back."

"You cut your hair!" Dori said in an utterly horrified voice and everyone turned to look at me, jerking their heads so violently I could swear I heard some of them crack.

"Hey you really did. I didn't notice that." Not surprising Alex never notices hair. I went strawberry blonde for a whole month before and he didn't realise it at all.

But seriously, my hair was all chopped off to my chin and I had bangs, how could anyone fail to miss that?!

"Lots of split ends and damage, they had to hack a lot of it off."

"When did you get it cut anyway?"

"There was a waiting time at the pizza place and the salon was right across the road."

"But now you won't be able to braid it!" Kili sounded so horrified it was actually kind of amusing.

"I know but my head feels so light I feel like I should just toss my hair around like I'm a backup dancer in a nineties music video!"

"There's no shame in cutting off your hair?"

"Umm no? Why would there be, it's just hair. Grows back. Even if it doesn't it's okay, I have the bone structure to go bald."

"Like Shiho?" Alex asked. Shiho's his friend who's also a genius. They worked together on the same genetics research project and she shaved her head a few years ago, now she has a purple mohawk, it's _awesome_.

"I could rock a purple mohawk." No I couldn't, I'm not cool enough.

Cue choking noises from the Company. Except for Bilbo who looked confused.

We began climbing up the stairs which was pretty damn hard. The steps were built so big we were all but climbing each step. Well except for Alex who was tall enough to just step over them but even he stumbled and had to be helped up.

"This must be it." Thorin said, rushing forward as soon as he reached the top, right after Bilbo and me. "The hidden door."

Cue dramatic looking out into the horizon as the sun sets.

"Let all those who doubted us rue this day." And then loud cheering.

"Right then, we have a key, which means that somewhere there is a key hole." Dwalin began groping the wall along with the others while Thorin looked out at the sun again.

"The last light of Durin's day will shine upon the keyhole."

One by one all of them began searching rather desperately for the keyhole, tapping and hitting as the sun set. Alex and I just went off to the side and sat there with our arms crossed eating the caramel popcorn Alex had insisted we would need at some point. Then the axes and shovels and what not came out and they began trying to break the wall down while Thorin raged.

The sun finally set and all the efforts stopped. They looked so broken and sad, in the end Alex just couldn't help it.

"I thought we all agreed that the last light of Durin's day was the moon's light?"

"Right. Moonlight." Thorin said. Balin and the rest sat down while Thorin paced. Kili and Fili joined us in our popcorn munching.

"It's like we're in a movie theatre." Alex grinned around a mouthful of chewed food. So gross.

"We should go watch a movie, haven't seen one in ages."

"They're playing Avatar in 4D at the theatre at the Westside Mall."

"I'll book the tickets once we get back home."

"How can you sit there so calmly while we are mere inches away from our home? If this does not work then we shall have to wait yet another year for the door to be found!" Thorin growled and began very angrily walking toward us when the moonlight shone over the top of the mountain and the keyhole appeared.

With great ceremony Thorin put the key in and turned it. The door didn't just open magically like in movies where magical doors always open with a whoosh but it only took a bit of a push for the door to open.

It was a great emotional moment. Balin was outright weeping and one by one they all trudged in. It was strange to say the least, Thorin breathed so heavily as if he had never had air before and Dwalin was concealing tears as well.

"I know these walls, these halls, this stone."

Kili and Fili were also looking around in awe. "It feels like coming home." They said and I suppose that was when it became very obvious that dwarves are not like humans at all. I guess that was the Stone Sense thing they'd talked about on display that they knew instinctively that this was their true home. It was amazing and all sorts of heavy and sentimental.

Which means I was standing in the corner looking around awkwardly along with Alex.

"Herein lies the seventh kingdom of Durin's folk." Gloin read from the inscription on the mural overhead where Alex had banged his head. He was too tall for this passage. "May the heart of the mountain unite all dwarves in defence of this home."

"The throne of the king." Balin explained the etching to Bilbo.

"Ah. And what's that above it?"

"The Arkenstone."

"Arkenstone." Bilbo nodded his head as if he understood. "And what's that?"

"That, Master Burglar," Thorin said and we realised that he had been standing a fair bit away from the rest looking down a passage and brooding, "is why you are here."

"That is what you must steal." Balin explained.

"Right then," I clapped my hands and the spell that had woven itself over everyone was broken. "Let's set up a command centre shall we?"

We went down a few passages before coming to a slightly bigger place and Alex set up screens and all sorts of digital paraphernalia on the floor. I handed Bilbo an earpiece and mic to attach to himself and then passed them around to everyone.

"Now does this dragon have great hearing?" I asked.

"Yes?" Balin answered, confused. Everyone else was turning the earpieces and mics uneasily over in their hands and Alex was explaining to them how to use it.

"Okay then I'll mute the mics on our end so he won't hear us but that means neither will you Bilbo. And hold on." I put goggles on Bilbo who was getting very antsy under all this attention.

"What's that?"

"That's so we see what you see, Alex how's the signal?" Alex touched the screen and moved things about but we eventually had a view of what Bilbo was seeing.

But what he was seeing was my face in HD which looked awful, every single pore of my skin magnified to uncomfortable levels. I have never felt so ugly in my life, no wonder people use a million filters before uploading their selfies.

I pushed Bilbo away until my face wasn't seen in such clarity and handed him a little cylinder with a red button on it.

"Now if anything goes wrong, press this button. This is a panic button and as soon as you press it we get an alert and know to get you out of there. But if you see the dragon then we'll see him too and that means we'll be there anyway."

"But umm, what if the dragon-"

"Check it, we have Black Arrows." Alex held up one and nearly poked himself in the eye but thankfully Kili stopped him.

"And I gave them a little kick." Alex gloated. "They also explode." He imitated things blowing up with his hands.

"I would give you my gun as a precaution but if you don't know how to use it you might end up shooting yourself in the foot. I've seen it happen. It was not pretty."

"G-gun?" Bilbo swallowed.

"This thing." I held mine up.

"What damage could that possibly do to a dragon?" Thorin asked a bit too snidely for my liking.

"I don't know exactly what it would do to a dragon but it could blow a hole in your head big enough for me to wave hello to the person standing behind you."

Bilbo flinched at the graphic hyperbole that they don't actually know is a hyperbole because they have no guns here.

"Come on laddie, I'll show you the way." Balin said and walked away with Bilbo. Soon they were out of sight but we could hear them the whole time.

Bilbo is bloody brave. I mean it doesn't even matter if someone told me that there's no dishonour in not going down into the dragon's lair, I'd just stay away anyway. But Bilbo is actually insisting that he try to find some glowing white jewel that he probably won't even know about because he's a hobbit and not a dwarf. Man that hobbit is amazing.

I paced floor while we watched Bilbo's progress. Soon he was out onto the stairs leading to the treasury and we could see Erebor's treasure.

It was a LOT of treasure.

"Holy shit you wanted him to find the Arkenstone in this?!"

The image on the screen began to flicker the closer Bilbo got to the treasure and once he was actually on it, it became fairly blurry.

"Yeah the dragon is definitely alive and throwing off magical interference." Alex said.

"Can you get the thermal image?"

"Yeah, just a minute."

As Bilbo sifted through the treasure Thorin grew increasingly grumpy as everyone crowded around the screen seeing what Bilbo was seeing.

"What on earth is he doing?"

"Looking for a white stone obviously."

"That's not the Arkenstone, how could anyone even think of these paltry diamonds as the Arkenstone?!"

"He's never seen it before how is eh supposed to kno-?" I was cut off as the thermal image glowed on the screen. "Shit."

Because the thermal image had revealed a glowing dragon shaped thing under the mountain of gold coins that Bilbo was currently climbing. He was getting closer and closer to the head and the sound of sliding coins became very loud. A flash of horns and eyes appeared and then just as quickly disappeared as Bilbo eventually hid behind a pillar.

"Smaug!" Thorin growled and we prepared to move out. On the screen alarms started flashing.

Bilbo had hit the panic button.


	19. Chapter 19

"Shit!" Alex exclaimed suddenly. "I've lost everything."

"What do you mean?"

"It's like Bilbo's doing some magic, I can't hear him or Smaug and I can't see anything."

"It could just be the gold though right?"

"No the gold and Smaug are very self contained in their magic, its limited to their immediate surroundings, Bilbo would have to be submerged in gold for this to happen and even then it wouldn't be a blanket effec- Wait, I have visual again!"

And the 'visual' was of a giant freaking dragon, so huge and so close to Bilbo that only half his head and a golden eye surrounded by red scales was visible.

"There you are!" The dragon said, "Thief in the shadows."

"The dragon talks?! No one told me the dragon talks!" I hissed at Thorin who was staring at Smaug's picture on the screen in horror. "And it's talking to Bilbo, and Bilbo's talking to him!" I all but shrieked while Bilbo tried in vain to convince the dragon that he wasn't a thief. "We have to do something."

"No!" Thorin put a hand against the doorway leading in blocking my way. "I will not risk this quest for the life of one Burglar."

Now I have a bit of a temper on me. I get annoyed quite easily but that real deep anger, the kind that makes people carry grudges for years? That happens rarely to me. This was one such time and I was apparently not alone in my rage.

"Bilbo." Balin said and he sounded heartbroken. "His name is Bilbo."

"And your quest was to get the Arkenstone and summon the armies of dwarves to kill the dragon, if Bilbo doesn't make it out of there alive with it, your quest is over anyway. When Azog just stood there, you were an idiot and charged but now when we should fight you hide? Coward." I barked at him and went ahead anyway.

Balin followed me which was good because I would have gotten lost otherwise and Fili and Kili followed, Kili carrying his bow and exploding Black arrows with him.

"Hey Kili if you think killing the dragon is going to earn you brownie points with Tauriel you're wrong." Alex joked weakly into the mic and in the background I could hear Smaug telling Bilbo he could smell dwarves and human on him.

"-the humans of Dale used to try to appease me with sacrifices of virgins."

"Yes well I highly doubt Allie is...chaste." Bilbo was bloody discussing the status of my virginity with the dragon! He is so lucky I had more important things on my mind.

"Balin is there a way to go the higher areas?" He pointed me down another passage than the one we were taking.

"That should take you to a passage leading onto a balcony. But what do you plan to do?"

"Distract him. Tell Kili to get ready to take shots yeah?" All through this I could hear Bilbo and Smaug's conversation. For a dragon who had destroyed a nation of dwarves and a great city of humans, Smaug was quite polite. Then again so were many of the politicians and celebrities we'd represented at work and a lot of them were utter scumbags. I was halfway up the many stairs I had to climb when a certain part of their conversation caught my attention.

"-It's Oakenshield, that filthy Dwarvish usurper. He sent you in here for the Arkenstone, didn't he?"

"Balin?" I said into the mic.

"YES?" He shouted.

"Umm first off no nee dot shout and secondly, why does Smaug call Thorin 'Oakenshield'? He got that title at-"

"Azanulbizar. The dragon is in league with other evils."

"Great, just bloody great."

I mean what if these other evils he was in league with came after us to get revenge? We're so fucked. I'd finally reached the 'balcony' that Balin was talking about, and that thing? It was nothing more than a hole in the wall next to a little ridge. Literally, a hole in the wall, completely rough, as if it had been made with a sledgehammer. There was a pillar right next to it with a bigger ledge which connected to the other pillars as well, kind of like rafters in a roof and I thought that was a much better place to go to. Unfortunately the gap wasn't so small that I could just jump and make it so I had to get into the harness of the mountain climbing gear that was finally being put to use and jumped once I had the rope attached to myself on one end and some outcrop of the mountain on the other. It wouldn't do much I knew, Smaug had just angrily pushed a pillar over and he didn't even seem to be _trying,_ a rope and harness wouldn't do much against super sharp claws and teeth.

Finally I got to the pillar which allowed me a bird's eye view of everything and I mean everything.

Smaug is huge. So huge. Oh my _god_ is he huge.

That sounds dirty.

But seriously Smaug was as big as a skyscraper. And he was angry as hell, all but spitting fire talking about dwarves and their greed and just looming over Bilbo who looks small enough as is let alone compared to a dragon.

"-My teeth are swords, my claws are spears, my wings are a hurricane!"

"So it is true, the Black Arrow found its mark." Bilbo said so softly that even with the mic I almost didn't hear it. But I did and that must have meant Kili did too.

"Kili?" I asked.

"I know, I'm looking for the spot but we need to get Bilbo out of there."

"I'll distract Smaug." Not for the first time in my life I cursed the stupid things I ended up doing to save people. It's really very annoying, why can't people just stay safe? "Alex, if anything happens here go to Mrs Costanza and tell her it's Code Blue, scenario four."

"You have a contingency plan for dragon?"

"No the plan for the dragon was to run away screaming but that doesn't seem to be working out." I said into the mic before clearing my throat and cupping my hands around my mouth to yell. "Oi Smaug!"

Seriously, why do I do such stupid things?

"You, you're the human I smelt on the Barrel Rider." Smaug said looking up but not budging from his place.

"Yes well that would be my fresh as daisies deodorant. And don't think I didn't hear that little conversation about my 'chastity' or lack thereof, awfully rude that was." It is a good thing I have experience in lying in high stress situations because that meant I could talk to SMaug instead of voicing the high pitched screaming that was my actual thought process.

Smaug left Bilbo alone and flew up, finally, and I could see Fili and Balin leading him away. In the rafters Smaug seemed to almost float and he curled up around a pillar opposite where I was and I couldn't help but snort in laughter.

"You dare laugh at me?!" He snarled.

"Can't help it, you remind me of a cat the way you're all curled up. I know of one who curled up exactly like that around my neck."

And that was apparently a stupid thing to say because his tail flicked out from behind me being that he was sooooo long, and draped itself around my neck.

"Better?" He asked, sarcastic of course. Can't expect anything else from strange dragons that hoard gold.

"Now all I need you to do is grow soft fur. But you are surprisingly warm."

"Did you expect anything else from a dragon?"

"Well yes. I thought you'd be cold. Wrong assumption on my part considering that you're more dinosaur than lizard and scientists have found that dinosaurs are probably warm blooded."

"Dinosaurs? You compare me to others? There are no others like me." He laughed. It was not a nice sound. "And here I thought that my breathing fire would be a dead giveaway."

I had forgotten that dragons breathe fire. This was stupid of me. I seem to be doing a lot of stupid things lately.

Talking to a dragon still tops the list though.

"Well breathing fire might mean that you must be cold otherwise to preserve the heat for the fire. Besides which, how would I know if you were warm blooded when I'm not even certain f you have blood?"

"You doubt that I have blood?"

"I also doubt that you exist."

"Am I a dream then?"

"Bloody nightmare more like. Quite a bad one, although there was that one time I dreamt of the beast of Caerbannog." Killer rabbits are scary, I have never watched a Monty Python movie after that dream.

"I can't get a shot." Kili said into my ear but as luck would have it, Smaug was showing off his 'hurricane' wings and it was creating sufficient enough noise for Kili's voice in my ear to go unheard by him.

Thank heavens for the egos of men. Or well, male dragons.

"I could kill you with a single breath you know." He loomed overhead.

"I know."

"Oh? Not afraid? Do you think I will not strike you where you stand?"

"You probably would. But I'm still not afraid. Not of dying anyway."

"Not afraid of death? What a strange mortal."

"Not so strange. Immortality is something to be scared of. To be able to sleep for sixty years on a bed of cold gold when I could fly, _that_ is something to be afraid of. Death? Death is nothing." I am so good at lying. Cause in reality I am fucking terrified of dying. I really don't want to die. Seriously. No dying today, thank you very much.

Course I should have thought of that before I started talking to a fire breathing dragon. Why on earth would I willingly talk to a fire breathing dragon?!

Oh right, rescuing Bilbo and giving Kili a clear shot.

"So, I hear nothing pierces your armour. Want to put it to the test?"

"You think you can kill me?"

"You say I can't, I want to test that. Unless you're afraid. Perhaps there is something that pierces your armour after all?"

He leaned forward and growled in my face. There is no bad breath like dragon sleeping for sixty years kind of bad breath. I almost wished he would breathe fire because that would mean smelling smoke instead of bad breath.

"Why, human, do you find yourself in possession of a Black Arrow?" He quizzed.

"No, just this." I took my gun out. "I know what it can do to a man. But I don't know what it can do against a dragon's armour."

He chuckled.

"That tiny thing?"

For a moment I felt quite offended on behalf of my gun. But then I realised that for Smaug it really is a very tiny thing.

"This tiny thing." I confirmed.

"Has it tasted the blood of men yet? It must be tempered with blood, youngling."

"Do you know you're the only one who's ever called me young. Everyone else says I'm too old for my age, what is up with that? But no it hasn't tasted the blood of men. Maybe it'll taste the blood of dragon?"

"Go ahead, test its mettle on me." Smaug dared.

Once again, thank god for the egos of the male of all species.

Shots were fired. I emptied the clip and aimed all the bullets in the direction of the scale of his skin that had broken off. I suppose Smaug hadn't expected that because he just stood stock still for the entirety of it which really wasn't more than five seconds. Not surprising considering that all those who tried to kill him must have done it with bows and arrows and reloading those things can take some time. But not my baby.

Unfortunately none of my bullets pierced through that hollow space in his chest. Fortunately it hit a few scales around that area and though Smaug was pissed off and chasing me while I ran, I had given Kili a much bigger target to aim for.

But seeing as how I was up in the air on a pillar I had very little space to run. The only thing left to do was jump.

I figured the rope would at least lessen the impact of falling on top of loads of gold coins from quite a drop but I did not expect for Smaug to dive down after me and somehow get caught up in the rope. I stopped in mid air with a spine numbing jerk while he twisted and turned until it was thoroughly tangled around him. It didn't take more than a swipe of his claws for the rope to be cut and him to be free from the impromptu leash but the rope remained wound around his neck while he swooped down upon Fili Balin and Bilbo who had come out to distract Smaug from me, and on the other end of the rope, I dangled around his back trying very very hard to avoid hitting the sharp ridges on his back.

I found my bearings, surprisingly fast considering...you know, dragon and all that. I found myself a seat between the two parallel spiky ridges running down his back and almost fell over once again when he turned a corner. It was like riding a bike. An alive, fire breathing, horned bike.

A wave of heat ran through him and I knew he was going to try to burn the boys so I ripped a scale right off his back and drove the Swiss army knife I had right into his flesh. I don't think it hurt him, it probably didn't feel like anything other than a mosquito bite to him but it definitely annoyed him and he started bucking hard to throw me off.

"Kili!" I yelled as I felt myself falling off and another wave of heat running through Smaug but as if in slow motion I saw the Black Arrow Alex had made bury itself deep in Smaug.

Smaug screamed and writhed but didn't entirely stop until suddenly there was a loud sound, that of the arrow exploding inside of him and he stilled and dropped down to the treasure lifeless.

Right onto his back. Which meant that I was buried under a mountain of gold with a giant and very heavy dragon on top of me. After a great deal of heavy lifting, the dragon was taken off me and I could breathe. Thorin helped me walk when it became apparent that my spine was hurting quite a bit after being tossed around like a rag doll.

"Sure, now you show up." I said and glared at him but he seemed completely and utterly unaffected. He didn't even notice, turning back to the treasure and I chose to ignore his asshattery in favour of checking my injuries. Which were numerous.

My back was black and blue with bruises and there were a few cuts where the coins had dug in hard, I tasted blood in my mouth but whether it was from some internal impact or simply from the massive nosebleed I sported from banging my head into Smaug, I didn't know, my ribs were either broken or cracked, there was a fairly long gash running along my left arm where Smaug's spike had smashed into it and my ass still felt weirdly hot from sitting on top of a dragon that was about to breathe fire.

And with no adrenaline running through me to keep my mind off things, I was feeling all fo this acutely. And then there was the worry of exactly what was wrong with Thorin that had him just asking Oin cursorily about Fili, Kili and Balin who had all been thrown into walls due to the impact of exploding arrows and just walking off straight into the treasure instead.

And he was ignoring Smaug completely to look at the treasure instead which didn't make sense, Smaug was the reason Erebor had fallen, he was what took so many lives those years ago and yet he was looking at the treasure?

I'd come back to it but for the time being my priorities did not include Thorin's asshattery.

"We need to go to Laketown." I croaked out. "Tell them the dragon's dead, they can go back to their houses now. And get Salt and go home."

"Right you'd probably be wanting to recuperate." Dwalin said although his eyes were looking worriedly at Thorin. Like the rest of us.

Dude was acting crazy.

"Oh we'll be back. "

"We will?" Alex asked, confused. Can't blame him really, I mean every time he's suggested we stay here I've been very adamant in saying no. Not so adamant that we actually didn't come back of course, but still, the lack of hostility was probably a surprise.

"Hey my main issue was the dragon and now that's not a problem anymore plus we're all alive, who'd have thought that would happen? Besides which, I promised Thorin that if he ever got the gold sickness I'd whack him over the head."

Seeing as how he was total douche earlier, I really want to whack him in the head and the Gold sickness seems as good as excuse as any. Unless the reason he's acting weird is because of the Gold sickness?

"But first things first, we get Salt and give him back to Mrs Costanza."

And then the really good pain drugs I brought with me kicked in and everything went wonderfully hazy and it was off to sleep.


	20. Chapter 20

Somehow while I was...drugged and asleep, Alex managed everything very well. He figured out how to use the forges and drew up plans for a pulley system that would allow just the thirteen of them to carry the Smaug carcass out of the city. He also built a rudimentary engine and fitted it to the bike which meant I did not have to pedal all the way to the camp outside Laketown. That was good because my spine and arms and ribs were really not up to any intense physical activity let alone pedalling all the way to Laketown which is what would have happened otherwise because Alex can’t really ride a bicycle without stabilisers.

“Don’t worry we’ll be back soon.” I told Bilbo. He looked extremely worried and had along with Balin tried his best to convince us to stay.

Something was up with Thorin. It was probably the gold sickness really but we wanted to give him the benefit of doubt and not just accuse him willy-nilly. He was picking through the treasury incessantly. On our journey there whenever he talked of Erebor it was always about the city’s walls the markets and the mines. But since we’d taken back Erebor the only parts he’d seen were the treasury. He was working around Smaug’s body to look for the Arkenstone and it was strange how he didn’t even flinch or anything when he saw the dragon. He hated Smaug but somehow his hate had dialled down into a dislike.

“Good.”

“Relax it’ll be fine. You’ll do great without getting underway and having to take care of me and without Alex constantly asking questions about...everything.”

“You’re part of the Company lass, you belong here.” Balin said kindly and I disagreed.

“Right now the only place I belong is my wonderful tub. Filled with hot water and bubbles, some bath salts. Maybe some rose oil, some candles on the side.”

“Well then we’ll get the plumbing here working for you.”

“Aww, thank you! But yeah do that because you all need baths. You might not know this but I kind of hold my breath when any of you are too close. And by too close I mean five feet away.”

Balin laughed and looked like he was about to say something when his eyes fixed on something behind me.

“You’re leaving.”

I turned to find Thorin standing there. Incredibly strange, really.

“I thought you’d be in the treasury.”

“So you slink off while I’m not looking?”

“I have to get the cat. My life depends upon it. And the people of Laketown deserve to know that they can go back to their homes and that the dragon’s dead. I know you guys had a hard time wandering but frankly I’d rather be in your place than theirs. Every single time they’d see the Lonely Mountain they’d be thinking about the dragon and that cannot be easy.”

“I suppose that is true.”

“It is true. I haven’t been this relaxed since Beorn’s place, just been too wound up thinking about Smaug.” It thought over that while Thorin brooded. “Although the relaxed feeling may be due to the painkillers.”

“Very well then, go get your cat.” He loomed and grabbed my arm. “But you _must_ return.”

I suppose he thought he was being intimidating. But seriously, I’d seen him blush at my accidental double entendres. Blush. Most people would laugh or smirk but he _blushed_. Hard to be intimidated when I’m imagining him anime style with red diagonal lines on his cheek. And stars in his eyes while he makes kissy faces. God that is hilarious.

“Why are you smiling like that?” He growled. Apparently my thoughts showed on my face.

“Nothing just thinking of something funny. Anyway we should be back in a few days, get that dragon out before he rots and stinks up the place and try not to get gold sickness alright?”

“As you wish milady.”

“Come on Thorin, we both know I’m no lady.” I clicked my tongue and winked.

I was soo high on painkillers. Luckily they wore off by the time we got to the Laketown shore camp. Unluckily they wore off by the time we got there which meant the pain was back. It’s a good thing I’m a woman and have monthly experience with intense pain because otherwise I would have been screaming bloody murder when we finally got into the camp establishment.

“Halt who goes the-Oh it’s you.” Bard who was standing guard made a face and I remembered that he was one of the people who really did not want to let the dwarves go into the mountain.

“We’re just here to inform you that the dragon is dead and you can move back to your town and also, where’s the cat? Where’s Salt?”

He looked dazed and actually stumbled.

“Smaug is dead?”

“Well if he wasn’t then he has somehow managed to get himself the power to stink up a mountain with the smell of rot. Seriously though, it smelled like dragon before, now it just smells of decaying dragon which is really a terrible smell.”

Bard climbed onto a pole that was holding up a tent and yelled for the whole settlement to hear. “Everybody, the dragon is dead!”

And then there were cheers and whispers and tears of joy.

Alex had taken to the dramatic nature of everything in world pretty well and so he began telling people of how Smaug was brought down. By the end of the day, the people of Laketown were calling me Dragonstabber/Dragonrider.

Alessia Dragonstabber. There’s a weird name, sounds straight out of a MMORPG. I’ll bet my character comes equipped with some flimsy armour that is more of a metal corset that pushes boobs up to create the perfect heart shaped target for an arrow. I’ve always wondered how those characters survive. How did the Tomb Raider do all that stuff, when Kili was teaching me to shoot a bow my barely there boobs were getting in the way all the time, how did she shoot guns with those knockers?

But through all the festivities there was no sign of Salt.

We asked around and no one had seen Salt at all so it was assumed that Salt had stayed in Laketown. Consequently when the town people moved back to their houses we went along with them, Bard even offered us a room in their house rather than the inn which I wasn’t too keen on but Alex was really excited about.

See while neither of us were too fond of the idea of suddenly having ‘parents’ Alex was rather excited by the thought of having cousins and since Bard was supposed to have adopted the Chief that made Bain, Tilda and Sigrid, kind of our family.

And Alex really liked that.

Strange though how he’s never managed to make friends, well friends who live in the same country, back home but somehow here he’s managed to socialise with all sorts of people with ease. Even The Chief and her husband who were shitty parents and arrogant scientists back in our world were actually respected politicians who actually did things for their community here. What is it about Middle earth that does that, why is it so good at bringing out the best in people from home?

And why has it not improved me?

But there we were, one day into our stay in Laketown with Salt nowhere to be seen and Alex becoming the best of friends with Bain. They were talking about stuff and giggling about it. I had tried getting involved in that conversation but seeing as how I wasn’t a teenager I didn’t quite get the jokes.

In between all the laughter and teasing though there was a slight clunking sound and I sneezed hard when sawdust fell over my face. That only caused more laughter because apparently I sound like a kitten when I sneeze but for the most part I just wondered where the dust had come from. I looked at the ceiling for a bit but the sun was setting and it was causing a glare from the window on the building opposite. It was when I went to close the curtain that I saw it in the reflection of the windows of the clock tower next to the inn.

Over our heads was an orc, stalking and sniffing at the air as clear as could be. While I couldn’t quite make out any features of the face when he turned the ridges on his shoulder became clear and I still remembered a particular orc who had been following us along the river in Mirkwood who had metal plates sticking out of his skin.

Bain, Tilda and Sigrid hadn’t noticed anything wrong but Alex could probably see the worry on my face. I took the phone out from my pocket and typed out a message before sliding it over to him taking the gun out of the holster in the back.

He whispered something in Bain’s ears and the boys looked at me with bloody wide eyes. I kept one eye on the reflection and another on them. The boys had frozen to the point where the girls had noticed and Sigrid looked at them worried.

“What’s-“ Before she could say anything I slashed a hand at my throat and Alex caught the hint, leading the conversation in different directions. Even though there was a hint of tension to it, their chatter resumed and the orc who had stilled began his prowling again. Bain had scurried off to a corner and returned with a spear and stood protectively around the others, handing them their own set of weapons which were little more than heavy tools.

Seeing as how they were decently enough armed I raised my gun to the ceiling and fired shots. Judging by the spray of blood I saw coming out of his head in the reflection, my aim had been luckily true and his body tumbled over the edge to fall into the water with a loud splash. For a moment I thought we were fine but then came screams and shouts from the outside.

“Orcs!”

Things went to shit pretty badly then. Orcs were streaming into the inn and there was a lot of screaming and shouting and general chaos.

With so any people panicking and running around ducking for cover or just plain smacking orcs around (with a fish nonetheless, how strange) I couldn’t use my gun, I might accidentally shoot someone else. So I just put the safety on and began pistol whipping orcs across the head and kicking and punching them. The townspeople were putting up a decent enough fight, probably motivated by the fact that Smaug was dead and that only got better when Tauriel and Legolas arrived and began kicking ass all over the place.

“Are you alright?” Legolas asked when the last orc was dead.

“I’m perfect. You get anywhere with Tauriel or still?”

“Is this really the time to discuss this?”

Tauriel was helping the few townspeople who were injured in the fight. No life threatening injuries and it had been a quick fight. The Orcs had been chasing our Company and weren’t exactly prepared for the fight that the entire town had put up.

“Did you want me to wait until she was actually over here to do that?”

He glared at me but it was an amused sort of glare. “Funny.”

“ _I_ thought so.”

“You would.” He smiled briefly before his eyes turned back to the Lonely Mountain. “So, I hear the dragon is dead.”

“Yes he is.”

“And you had a hand in that.”

“Not really. I was just the diversion, I kept him busy while they lined up the shot.”

“Interesting tactics.”

“Maybe you’ll use them some day.”

“I am afraid that day will come sooner than I want it to. War is coming.”

I could only shrug. “Where I come from there’s always a war of some sort going on.”

“Perhaps but do these wars always hit you close to home? I imagine not. The Orcs have grown too confident and move in droves. We must expect an imminent attac-“

And by some divine interference at that exact moment, Salt appeared out of nowhere and attacked Legolas. The blonde stumbled around with a cat attached to his scalp before Salt decided enough was enough and finally let go of Legolas’ hair.

It was nothing short of hilarious. All that wonderful long hair of his that had been perfectly coiffed throughout his fight with the Orcs was now all over the place, frizzing out and falling out of its braids. And as if his day couldn’t get any worse, Tauriel saw all that and rushed over.

“Are you alright?” She sounded amused. Which was a much more polite reaction than the one I was displaying which was just plain pointing and laughing.

“I’m fine.” Legolas quickly fixed his hair and glared at me. “I am tempted to rouse my father to go to war upon you to destroy that hellion.”

“Legolas please, Salt would win and you know that. Besides I have to return him to his owner before she kills me.”

He brightened immediately. “You’re getting rid of the furball?”

“So mean! But yes, Salt is going back home where he belongs.”

With Salt now found Alex and I went back home for a brief time. We stayed for a few days then and returned Salt to Mrs Costanza, I had a hot bath and my bruises went down a much more sensible yellow green. I figured everything was finally looking up, Erebor was reclaimed, Laketown was fine, Legolas and Tauriel weren’t dead and everyone of importance was alive. All in all quite a nice few days.

But I ahd promised Thorin that we’d return and so we came back. The little wormhole device of Alex took us right back to where we’d arrived the last time, the road between Dale and Erebor. Only this time Dale wasn’t as empty as it was supposed to be. It was nearly night when we’d arrived and fires were blazing in the ruins of Dale and so that’s where we went, sneaking around to see what exactly was going on.

It didn’t take long to realise that the entirety of Laketown was there and we found Bain handing out blankets at a corner of a street.

“Bain, what’s going on?”

“The thrushes told father that an army of Orcs were on their way here so we came to Erebor to ask for shelter-”

What?

“But the Elves beat us here and their King decided to set siege to Erebor-”

What???

“And then the Dwarf King said he wouldn’t offer any support to those in consort with elves-“

Okay that isn’t too surprising.

“And because the elves and the dwarves don’t believe that the Orc army is coming we’re stuck here waiting for them. All of them.”

“But couldn’t Tauriel and Legolas-“

“Oh Tauriel’s been banished and Legolas decided that if Thranduil banished her he would go with her and they took off on horseback.”

We left for less than a week and this world went to shit.

 


End file.
